How Would You Do... Summoner?

[Silverquick]

Well that one would definitely require a complete ground up rework of the class... and for that matter a complete rework of the pet interface.

Another thing those that don't actually play the job don't know are the kinks in the Pet interface. There is a major delay due to queueing of the pet attacks that creates enormous delays in the response time between the time you issue the pet a command, and they actually obey.

Example: Trying to get Garuda to do Contagion can take upwards of 3-10 seconds at times if he's busy.

The second bug... or should I say deficiency... Enkindle itself. As above... there will be a delay in the time it takes the Enkindle to actually be performed with the pet. SO.. when you kick in Enkindle on say Garuda, and the target dies before he does Aerial Blast.... the attack never happens and your button goes into Cool Down anyway... so you lose your Enkindle for the next 3 minutes. One of those little tricks you learn as a SMN it so only use it on the target with the most HP or you might just lose it.

So the pet interface as a whole would need to be rebuilt. I suspect this is yet another reason why they've given up on pet classes as a whole. It would be a massive undertaking... and if they don't do that FIRST... then they just screw up the whole class by making everything pet centric.

------

But you might get some Egi Glamors.

Those wouldn't hose up the Job or create class balance issues either.

[Nerisu]

Or they could just add a Bahamut-egi animation near our characters when we perform Deathflare to at least give us an illusion that we are summoning it and it's the one performing the attack. You know, like NIN's new frog summon jutsu.

And just like Silver said, pet commands are very clunky. Just imagine missing the trance window just because the "Bahamut-egi" decides it's auto-attack is more important than Deathflare. It's a good concept, though, but not viable because of how the game's pet system works.

[Jandor]

Well that one would definitely require a complete ground up rework of the class... and for that matter a complete rework of the pet interface.

Another thing those that don't actually play the job don't know are the kinks in the Pet interface. There is a major delay due to queueing of the pet attacks that creates enormous delays in the response time between the time you issue the pet a command, and they actually obey.

Example: Trying to get Garuda to do Contagion can take upwards of 3-10 seconds at times if he's busy.

I play the job mate, I know the pet interface can be clunky. It should be fixed regardless of what other changes are or are not made to SMN.
"Don't make these changes because a significant part of the job doesn't function properly as it is." What sort of reasoning is that?

Or they could just add a Bahamut-egi animation near our characters when we perform Deathflare to at least give us an illusion that we are summoning it and it's the one performing the attack. You know, like NIN's new frog summon jutsu.

That would be nice, and more than acceptable. This is a 'how would you do it' thread, so I went for what I want rather than what might potentially happen.

[Silverquick]

"Don't make these changes because a significant part of the job doesn't function properly as it is." What sort of reasoning is that?

The smart kind....

....where you don't end up hosing the Job up with good intentions... because you didn't think things through.

[Shurrikhan]

"Don't make these changes because a significant part of the job doesn't function properly as it is." What sort of reasoning is that?

The smart kind....

....where you don't end up hosing the Job up with good intentions... because you didn't think things through.

OP here,

Not trying to appear authoritarian or anything, but just to clarify, let me restate the premise for the thread: if you were to have made the Summoner, e.g. before there was a ever an implementation of the XIV 2.0 Summoner, or revised it for 3.0, how would you have done it?

Clunky systems are definitely a concern worth mentioning, but their existence does not preclude later mechanics built upon them, so long as it's feasible that those systems could still be revised.

I'm still working on my own example, which has unfortunately bloated into multiple pages worth of documentation... I'll finish it up and then try to trim it down, or at least break it into several sections of hide-able text.

:: To clarify further for you, Silver:

it is a creative venture thread, not one aimed specifically at pragmatics. Nor am I sealing off input from every person who does not consider themselves a SMN "main". Please do not harass other for using the thread as intended, even if you feel that they have been shortsighted or have skipped crucial details; these things can be a team effort... And in the end, the job doesn't belong to its mains, though I do agree that it should largely favor their opinions as those already invested. But, you have 4 other threads in your recent post history in which to continue letting the world know that you ARE a Summoner MAIN. I'm trying to get us to look at the systems that can best aid attraction to others who have put off the job (often due to these exact issues) with the least cost of attractiveness to those already invested, as in your post #20.

:: This thread is not "the enemy". It does not intend to replace your current implementation of Summoner; rather, it's using the comparison between what was made and what might have been to gather insights into design generally, for instance, that using persistent AI units (e.g. Summoner pets) who must check whether they are in fact summoned, their position, the mob's position, their spell cooldown, and then recheck every instance of position and relative position as they chase a mob because there's no predictive movement nor any elastic or otherwise extended ability range to cover for issue, is probably a bad idea, and that while pet swapping might sound thematically interesting, spending 6 seconds to do so for little to no advantage is not. From these targets we could then move towards actual solutions for either the mechanical systems or ability/spell arsenals of something like Summoner to make it more effective, more deeply interesting, and more broadly attractive.

[Silverquick]

OP here,

Not trying to appear authoritarian or anything, but just to clarify, let me restate the premise for the thread: if you were to have made the Summoner, e.g. before there was a ever an implementation of the XIV 2.0 Summoner, or revised it for 3.0, how would you have done it?

Clunky systems are definitely a concern worth mentioning, but their existence does not preclude later mechanics built upon them, so long as it's feasible that those systems could still be revised.

I'm still working on my own example, which has unfortunately bloated into multiple pages worth of documentation... I'll finish it up and then try to trim it down, or at least break it into several sections of hide-able text.

Cool...

But I am also here as someone who actually plays the job... and Mains it.

Here to bring to you and everyone else here... the reality of playing an actual Summoner, and including class balance lessons with our other sister jobs, and a direct focus on what the Arcanist > Summoner/Scholar actually is and their roles.

Along with all the other realities you need to think about.

[Jandor]

If I'd have made SMN I'd have made pet actions take less than 3-10s to activate.

[Jerbob]

I will settle for nothing less than a complete rewrite.

1. Preserving existing Summoner as Arcanist

Summoner as it stands is an alright job really. Lots of people like it, and with good reason. There's no reason to get rid of the work that's been done on the job.

Part of the solution is to create an Arcanist job stone and just merge the entirety of the current Summoner into Arcanist. A few model swaps for the Egi/Carbuncles (to, for example, those elemental sprites) and a rewording of the cutscenes and tooltips - the visual components can be reused almost entirely, at least from 1-50 - and it's done. The trance mechanic can be rebranded as some sort of "super-Ruin", accelerating natural decay to frightening levels.

Scholar can have the same treatment. Lore-wise, this can be seen as a split in Arcanima traditions, or something of that nature. One branch of Arcanists study disease, the other healing. There's a side benefit that SCH and [New ACN/Old SMN] aren't glued together any longer.

The Summoner name is now free to be used for something new, and the players who quite rightly want to preserve their favourite gameplay can do so as Arcanists.

2. Focus as a pet job

A lot of people really hate the idea of a pet job - apparently including the developers. I really like pets, and seeing as this thread is "How would you do", I'm going to run with it anyway!

I don't want to get into a massive debate in this post about why I think the pet job model is appropriate for Summoner. If people want to question the decision later, though, I'm happy to discuss separately.

Current Summoner is a "job with a pet", like MCH, not a "pet job". The distinction is important, I think. As a Summoner in XIV I don't feel like I'm summoning anything - all I'm doing is rotting something (ruin), infecting something (DoTs), and drawing in ambient aether from a powerful source to blow stuff up like Conjurers do (Trance). I want my summoning to be at the very core of what I'm doing, and to do that 95% of my damage needs to come from something I've summoned. No-one wants 5 minute cutscenes involving dragons flying in from outer space, so a pet is a good alternative.

3. Mechanical considerations

People often mention that a pet-focused job can be broken because it can ignore mechanics, the pet is expendable, and so on. I agree that this is an issue, but I don't think it is insurmountable.

Egis are currently fairly sturdy - AoEs tend not to damage them excessively, and moving the pet around can keep them safe when it's necessary. Sustain and AoE healing spells from healers do the rest. But what if it wasn't enough?

I'd like Summoners to actively have to maintain their pets. If pets are less sturdy, they require more management and focus, and thus potentially more skill to control effectively. Having to move one's pet unnecessarily results in a damage loss, as does having to resummon it, etc etc. If the player does things right then the pet should be something that can be maintained indefinitely with a little TLC, but the pet certainly shouldn't be something that can just be summoned and forgotten about.

If Summoner's pet supporting actions require cast times and the like, then they are not at an advantage compared to other casting jobs. In order for their pet to operate effectively, the Summoner needs to remain stationary at certain times.

There'd also have to be a revamp of the existing pet mechanics - currently they are unresponsive, slow, and prone to just plain not working. This needs to be fixed regardless of a Summoner overhaul. It's just not good enough.

4. Fix the lore

I want to make my feelings about lore really clear - SE controls every bit of it. If they say we can't summon Primals because of lore, that's just a thinly-veiled way of them saying they don't want us to summon Primals "just because". Yes, of course there is a massive amount of intertia in the story that supports this. I wouldn't seek to change it - it's fundamental, and good stuff generally. But when it's being used to justify jobs not being developed properly, it ceases to be valuable.

Think about Egis. SE starts with the "you can't safely summon Primals because X" line. The Egi clause is a "but" - "You can't safely summon Primals BUT you can transmute their essence and summon that." SE decide where the loopholes are, and they decide what form they take. There is no reason that Summoners have to summon Egis, or indeed anything remotely resembling them.

I do think that summoning Primals in any form is stupid for a level 1 Summoner. There needs to be a build up. There are lots of entities in the XIV universe that are powerful and miscellaneously magical, many of which are former summons from previous incarnations of Final Fantasy - is there any reason we can't negotiate/defeat/bind those and summon part of their essence instead?

Carbuncle, Fenrir, Siren and the like all exist in some form in this game. Interestingly, most are the "weaker" or "lower level" summons from previous games. So I propose that our Summoners summon those instead - at least to start with. Once they start to reach higher levels, Primal-type summoning can become a feature.

5. What are the pets like?

Because Summoners are putting all their eggs into one basket - the pet - each one needs to be designed as carefully as any other job's most important actions.

A common problem raised about pets in XIV is that there isn't scope to add much variety. The hyper-restrictive and unimaginative job system, and lack of the elemental wheel, are equally to blame for this, and I'm not sure I have a solution that ticks all the boxes SE likes to have ticked. However, I'm strongly of the opinion that these restrictions need to be pushed, not pandered to.

We also need to make sure that pets have a very different "feel" but don't have insurmountable advantages over one another - Contagion, obviously, is the shining example. Summoners should be encouraged to swap their pets for different types of battle - not every 30 seconds, which would be tiresome and trivialise the uniqueness of the pets, but certainly for different bosses or different types of solo tasks.

I think a case can easily be made for a single-target focused pet and an AoE-focused pet. Having the former as melee-oriented and the latter as backline-oriented makes sense too. I also like the idea of having a "passive support" style pet that is both a caster and a supporter - dealing damage by enhancing one's enemies is a favourite trope of mine, and many Summoners and summons in the FF series have done just that. I'm sure it doesn't appeal to everyone, but options are nice to have.

Seeing as this is a "How Would You Do" thread, I'm also keen to include something a lot of people won't approve of - a hybrid casting/healing pet. I'm a big fan of doing things "the wrong way" with friends - "all mage" dungeon runs, playing the classes without job stones and seeing what they can do, etc etc. Doing things differently, "just because". It's of niche appeal and certainly not for everyone, especially the more intense players, but having a healing option for Summoner would make me very happy. It doesn't even have to be good compared to our dedicated healers - indeed, it shouldn't be, as we do not want to see Summoners replacing real healers - but having it there would be really fun for at least some people. Or perhaps just me, I don't know.

I'm sure people here are more imaginative than me. There are more options. Even if the pets are filling the same general role - killing stuff - having them do it in a distinct and fun way beyond just having different animations is enough for people to have their favourites. It all adds character to the job.

Naturally, as the Summoner has very few / no direct damage abilities itself, the pet needs to step up and fill this role entirely. I don't like the "spam Ruin" playstyle, so I'd be eager to have multiple abilities per pet with slightly longer recast times - abilities you are encouraged to mix and match appropriately for the best effect. Not necessarily something so routine as 1-2-3 combos, but even those are better than "spam Ruin". Beyond the pet's basic auto-attack, nothing should execute automatically - interacting with the pet is the core of the job, after all.

6. How should it look?

Visually, for the pets, I think it's essential to go down the Carbuncle route of decent-looking pets rather than the Egi "is it made of sack cloth and string" route. It's a common complaint made by those who dislike the existing Summoner. I have absolutely no attachment to my floating rock or my weird skeleton bird - they're nothing. Make them interesting to look at - I want a Fenrir pet to look like a canine, not a floating tail with ears. I want Siren to look like a feathery woman bird thing, not a harp with eyes. They don't have to be so huge as to blot out the sun either, as people seem to fear!

For the Summoner itself, the visual aspects should really emphasise the connection between the pet and the Summoner. I don't want pet abilities that are executed silently - everything the pet does should be reflected by an animation for the Summoner. Arcane gestures and the like. Things like the existing Rouse are nice - the Summoner clearly isn't doing anything directly, but the pet visually receives a benefit.

7. Primals?

They've got to be in there. A Summoner without Ifrit? Ramuh? Impossible!

I understand SE's desire that Primals be something spectacular, and thus all the stifling lore. I don't think this means we aren't able to include them, though.

Existing Summoner has the Trance mechanic. Something similar would work for New Summoner. Building resources, accumulating stacks of something, and in the end it culimates in the summoning of a Primal Avatar for a few seconds. It'd be suitably epic, and keep Primals in their place as something special. It'd also be the easiest summoning method to lorespain away as "safe". Primals should also feature in the Summoner Limit Break for obvious reasons.

8. Job specifications

Based on the above, I suppose what I want boils down to this:

• Fold the current Summoner into Arcanist, make Arcanist a fully fledged job, and detach SCH completely.
• The Summoner name is released for a new purpose. Nothing from the original Arcanist!Summoner need influence the new design.
• Pet as the focus - direct damage actions kept to a minimum, preferably none.
• Summoners must actively support their pets, both for durability/healing/shielding and damage bonuses. Casting times here maintain balance.
• Start off Summoners with non-Primal summonable entities.
• A variety of pets that are both different in focus/role, and different in how they work.
• Pet damaging abilities not just a clone of "spam Ruin", and that need to be actively used, not automated.
• Pets that don't look like I peeled them off the bottom of my shoe.
• Summoner has animations when activating pet abilities.
• Primals can feature later, summoned briefly and powerfully, with lore tweeked in some way to make the summoning safe.

I think this is a firm foundation for a job concept!

As for specific actions, potencies, MP costs... the specifics are kind of unimportant, really. As might be obvious, I've written up my own version of this concept that includes all those sorts of details, but... given the Summoner we have now, I think it's the general idea of something different that is important, not anything more detailed.

As usual, apologies for excessive wall of text.

[Shurrikhan]

Snip

So, would Summoner would be significantly easier to balance if its AoE damage were reined in? Its AoE damage has been known to be "king" so long as mobs are up for at least 5 ticks, but I haven't personally experienced enough back to back comparisons between it and BLM with equal gear on each to compare their metrics thoroughly. However, it seems reasonable to me that if SMN had its AoE reined in it would face less of a niche bonus from certain fights that allow for by-event AoE burst, around which SMN seems more manipulable to me than BLM, and could therefore have some of its primary output raised.

This might be similar to the (albeit awkward) AoE tapering effect placed on Holy and Flare, or perhaps something new, such as doubling the duration of all diseases you've placed on the target or any enemy within 8 yalms of it and then spreading those diseases evenly (rounded to the nearest tick count) over all enemies within 8 yalms, extending the duration of all preexisting diseases up to their maximum duration. In the latter case, the dps would be similar, but more slightly Aetherflows would have to be spent and more DoTs cast over time in order to maintain a mass plague. In this way, AoE DPS is tapered slightly, even while made a bit more fluid (no wasted duration from refreshing DoTs via Bane).

I suppose we could also attempt to specifically increase SMN's single-target turret damage through a new mechanic. Just as a parallel, consider this mechanic from an another MMO briefly: each consecutive (maximum-cast time) cast of a particular spell allowed the caster to channel its spell for an additional 15% casting time, compounding, for 20% more damage, compounding, to a maximum of 3 stacks. Each time the spell is cancelled, interrupted, or cast at less than its maximum duration, one stack is removed. While the variable cast time would be impossible with XIV's slow tick rate, so long as the ideal cast count fits with the filler portion of a CD window that would allow for the mechanic, this would theoretically work well. (In practice, it may also require that the effect does not fade when the mechanic fades, so long as the spell started during the effect, as long begged for with Enochian's double-checking to match its workings with AF3/UI3's singly-checked double-speed casts and reduced mana costs on opposite elements.)

E.g.
Cast time: 2.5, 2.875, 3.3, 3.8
Relative maximum potency: 200, 240, 288, 346

To better balance the pair starting from its contender instead, giving BLM a traited half-CD Swiftcast (60s > 30s) would indeed allow for much greater usage of Flare and greater mobility in general. As far as simple fixes going a long way, your suggestion definitely seems to me as well like it'd have the most bang for the buck. In the end, the BLM is still most hampered by its long Convert CD in regards to Flare usage in combat, especially now that the low-cost Fire IV actually deals more potency than the all-consuming nuke (albeit at lower minimum mana cost, iirc), so this would primarily play into the occasional mobile F4 or AF-refreshing F1, or Flare only as an AoE.

The only thing that frightens me about it as how damn well BLM scales compared to most jobs. Given high enough secondary stat percentiles, even a Foe-less BLM will outperform a Monk in any length of DPS race, simply because each stat weighs slightly to significantly higher for BLM than anyone but Bard (with its Crit contribution). I want QoL and niche-breaking changes wherever possible, but whenever fights advantage the BLM, it often seems by the end of every expansion to be the least in need of a buff, as long as its handled by a good player.


:: Still working on Post #2... >.>

As usual, apologies for excessive wall of text.

You should never really apologize for text-walls. : P
Thanks for all the ideas!

[Silverquick]

So, would Summoner would be significantly easier to balance if its AoE damage were reined in? Its AoE damage has been known to be "king" so long as mobs are up for at least 5 ticks, but I haven't personally experienced enough back to back comparisons between it and BLM with equal gear on each to compare their metrics thoroughly. However, it seems reasonable to me that if SMN had its AoE reined in it would face less of a niche bonus from certain fights that allow for by-event AoE burst,around which SMN seems more manipulable to me than BLM, and could therefore have some of its primary output raised.

I see.... so you don't actually play a SMN like most of those in this thread...who only want to change to their version of a job and probably wouldn't play it anyway even if it was what they want to turn it into. you just want a new job. So you really DO actually just want a beastmaster style job... not an a SMN.

The base answer is NO it would not be easier to balance if its AoE were reigned in.

Well for the record I did play BLM and SMN in the same gear up the levels. At present BLM is 57 and SMN is obviously 60th and my actual main.

So the answer to your question is no... AoE damage is completely different from Single Target. They have different uses... for different situations.

REASON...
You only find large crowds of mobs as "Trash packs" or cannon fodder minions. This portion of the dungeon is where any AoE class... much like the Control Wizard of D&D thrives (Also known as the original D&D Magic User). Its in multi-target environments where he plies his skills. In other games this is what you would call Crowd Control... whether its by something like an AoE sleep or Mez or whether its a Huge Fireball that blows them all up... this is the "Controlling the Battlefield".

The Single Target Spellcaster is much more akin to the one on one mage, with the Huge Powerful one shot type mega spells that you see the BLM using. These are the Boss Mob battle guys (Fire IV). The AoE guy (much like the Summoner) clears the way for the Single Target damagers to step in and do their thing. Hence, this is where the BLM shines.

While the AoE damage is great to get you there... its a little weak in single target situations and doesn't do as much damage. This is evidenced when you see both the BLM and the SMN are standing side by side where the BLM.... can nuke his heart out.

I could go through the levels for you but I'll just stop short and give you a basic breakdown example of what I mean.

The SMN will be doing a 6000 maybe Crit for 10K damage spell in an AoE radius... but once he's done it he'll be expended. So that's the extent of his big whammy on the Boss mob... So he's done 6000-10,000 damage.

The BLM will then step in, kick in Enochian and do 4 spells at 7000 damage each, landing huge chunks out of the Boss Mob's health with each one. Hitting a couple for 12,000 damage... so he's done 7000 + 7000 + 12,000 + 12000...

Who was more valuable here in these shoes?

Now we reverse the shoes...

On the way to the Boss Mob... they run into 10 mobs at once.
The SMN kicks in Dreadwyrm and Deathflares for 6000 damage... on all 10... maybe critting for 10,000 on a couple of them. 7 x 6000 + 3 x 10,000

The BLM uses Fire II on 12 of them doing 2500 damage on all 10... maybe critting for 4000 damage here and there. 7 x 2500 + 3 x 4000

Who was more valuable in this situation?

That's the answer to your question.

They are different tools for different jobs. One excels in one portion of it... another excels in the other.

As I said... the SMN and BLM compliment and mirror each other as equal but opposite. Hence why they are very well balanced at this time.

This might be similar to the (albeit awkward) AoE tapering effect placed on Holy and Flare, or perhaps something new, such as doubling the duration of all diseases you've placed on the target or any enemy within 8 yalms of it and then spreading those diseases evenly (rounded to the nearest tick count) over all enemies within 8 yalms, extending the duration of all preexisting diseases up to their maximum duration. In the latter case, the dps would be similar, but more slightly Aetherflows would have to be spent and more DoTs cast over time in order to maintain a mass plague. In this way, AoE DPS is tapered slightly, even while made a bit more fluid (no wasted duration from refreshing DoTs via Bane).

This is all completely irrelevent once you understand what I posted above...

They are used for different situations... so the BLM will come out on top in one situation... the SMN comes out on top in the other...

In reality they are closer than that in actual damage... but I needed you to understand where they differ... and why... you can't clip one and assume it fits the other.

One is stronger on one side, the other is stronger in the other. This is their balance point and how they are balanced against each other in the grand scheme of things. Remove that AoE damage from the SMN and you only gimp him... so now he has substandard AoE and no nich where he filled it perfectly before... and still allowed the BLM to flourish in his nich.

Aka... actual balance between the two Magical DPS Jobs in the game.

I suppose we could also attempt to specifically increase SMN's single-target turret damage through a new mechanic.

That is the serious mistake... because right now the two compliment each other. If you did that... the two would STEP on each other instead.

Now you created a conflict in the game balance between the two DPS Jobs... where they operated in harmony with each other prior.

And screwed everything up.

To better balance the pair starting from its contender instead, giving BLM a traited half-CD Swiftcast (60s > 30s) would indeed allow for much greater usage of Flare and greater mobility in general. As far as simple fixes going a long way, your suggestion definitely seems to me as well like it'd have the most bang for the buck. In the end, the BLM is still most hampered by its long Convert CD in regards to Flare usage in combat, especially now that the low-cost Fire IV actually deals more potency than the all-consuming nuke (albeit at lower minimum mana cost, iirc), so this would primarily play into the occasional mobile F4 or AF-refreshing F1, or Flare only as an AoE.

No actually it has nothing to do with that at all. But I also realize you don't play any of these jobs you want to suddenly rework out of nowhere... and without good reason.

The basic problem the BLM has in half the high level instances is that he LITERALLY CANT sit and do damage, there's too much movement. OTHER single target jobs and other melee single target damagers aren't as affected by it and can still play the game because their attacks are instant... and only have a recast timer... the BLM has a full blow cast time AND a recast timer... this is his balance point for doing such a large chunk of damage...

One problem... if he cannot ever plant himself TO do that damage... ALL that damage potential is for nothing...

So when it comes to high level instances that require a lot of movement it ends up being a situation where the BLM can't even participate...

Hence... the fix for the BLM has nothing to do with anything you're saying... He has to use Quickcast, Surecast, and Manawall and it needs to be much more effective than they are right now for the BLM Job.... if they are going to continue requiring THAT much in movement mechanics in Dungeons and Raids. Or you may as well just remove the Job entirely because NO amount of DPS you give him will ever be able to be used anyway.


Now you said SOOO much that I probably missed a few things. because the window you type in is tiny... and you made a mountain of a paragraph.

So if I missed something just bring it up again.