Developers Poor Attitude to Summoner

[loreleidiangelo]

I get increasingly frustrated at the absolute refusal to divorce the job from things like DoTs, Aetherflow, and Ruin spam, wgich seem far more suited to "combat strategist SCH" than "primal channeling SMN". I don't care whether they keep the Egis and put more focus on using and empowering them, or go the Trance/Demi route where we get big impressive summons and burst abilities on cooldowns, I just want to stop using poisons and a level 1 filler ability as my primary sources of damage on a level 70 "summon"er.

[Tahldon]

There is a lot of talk about how SMN isn't like the iterations of the job that has been in other games and I think that the version of SMN that was implemented in FFXIV was its own representation that definitely worked well.

Not that I am knowledged beyond the friends I have on my server who mained the job, but since this rework, many SMNs I know have all abandoned the job or are no longer having fun with it. I feel the devs should have stuck with the pre-4.0 version and added the Bahamut piece on top (even though he needs adjustments) and it would be all good. Instead, the job has been amended, I feel, to attempt to assuage those who felt it wasn't like what they remember before.

Who is to say of those who were saying such things were even playing the job to begin with. But now it's been changed and the players that were maining or playing it regularly don't even enjoy it anymore and are jumping ship in droves.

[Tahldon]

I don't feel that SMN was bad at all that it needed such a drastic divorce from what it was. Just as RDM had to be reimagined to fit in the world of FFXIV, SMN could have been left to do the same.

Sure, there are people who don't think it's so bad currently, but let us wait until the census to see if that opinion holds that sort of water... which I wager it will reflect the outcry we are having right now.

At this point, though, I don't see the devs going back on these changes despite the many people who don't agree with it.

So Naysay as it sounds ... SMN may be a wash until next expac

(Couldn't edit post from mobile btw)

[jackass1203]

Honestly I think they should just get rid of Egis and have them play more like traditional Summoners. As in dps normally and build up a gauge to be able to summon creatures that either do an action or stay out for a bit (30 sec to a minute) and be able to augment your abilities.
I honestly hate the way the egis work since when I’m trying to use abilities I have to spam that ability in order to get it to go off. As for the Physick working with Int thing I don’t really care if they do that.

[Claviusnex]

They tried though. Look at SMN pre 4.0:
Player solely used Garuda for Contagion; which extended DoTs. This let player focus less on DoT management and opened the window to spam ruin more. SE's Response: Remove one DoT and extend duration to 30s each and add a proc ruin spell; less DoT management and more ruin spam.
Players wanted a big bad primal pet: SE adds DB and the community is upset because it's too big and blocks view.
Players wanted Egi's to be more like other FF and do more like buff/debuff: SE add buffs and debuff in which the community responds with anger because Buff/Debuff meant lower dps numbers.

I'm sorry but the community got exactly what they asked for and are pissed because of it.

- Nobody asked for more Ruin and less DoT management. That was SE's idea to simplify the job.

- I can't speak to the rationale for the hugely, big Bahamut as I've never seen those requests. I can say being around for about 2 years I don't recall seeing a request for bigger egi's but I also wasn't historically a big reader of the forums.

- There aren't any complaints about getting the Devotion buff. It is the half assed implementation based on one target's proximity to our pet. It is obvious someone decided they needed something for utility as an afterthought.

The same goes for Sustain. SE said they figured Summoners could move their egi's out of harms way and nobody uses it anyway so who needs it. Let's not think about how it affects Titan or Ilfrit who by definition are meant to be in the thick of it. Regular pet movement might be workable if all of the Summoner DPS was through the egi. However 75% comes from the Summoner themselves. This means every manual movement of the egi takes away from overall DPS. Add in the other changes that gimp the Summoner and you have a broken class that didn't need be broken.

While it might not be a traditional FF Summoner the HW version was working pretty smoothly. If SE didn't like that they should have come out a said we are going to work on changing the Summoner toward its more traditional interpretation and fully designed the new job. If they didn't have the resources to do it properly for SB then they should not have made major architectural changes to the job and done the minimum required to build up to level 70. In the end they would have had more satisfied customers and fewer complaints.

[LineageRazor]

- Nobody asked for more Ruin and less DoT management. That was SE's idea to simplify the job.

- I can't speak to the rationale for the hugely, big Bahamut as I've never seen those requests. I can say being around for about 2 years I don't recall seeing a request for bigger egi's but I also wasn't historically a big reader of the forums.

Actually, yeah, these are both common complaints, or at least were years ago. For a long, long time, there was just about always a thread on the front page complaining about how tiny (and dumb-looking) the Egis were. Folks wanted to have the lumbering monstrosities they were used to from FFXI. As for DoTs, there were frequent criticisms that SMN were just WoW Warlocks with the serial numbers filed off and a pet tacked on, and that the resulting abomination was hardly a TRUE(tm) Final Fantasy Summoner at all.

I, personally, didn't mind SMN's new incarnation. The DoT focus, while new to Summoners, I took as just another quirk of this incarnation, like how Rydia used black magic or Yuna white. I personally found the abstract design of the egis to be neat (it's what you get when you try to summon a Primal using a geometry textbook!) and having played FFXI myself I knew how annoying and obstructive the giant summons could be (summoning Titan to block folks' view was an actual griefing tactic during NM farming). Nevertheless, I could certainly see why folks were disappointed, even if I wasn't, myself.

The same goes for Sustain. SE said they figured Summoners could move their egi's out of harms way and nobody uses it anyway so who needs it. Let's not think about how it affects Titan or Ilfrit who by definition are meant to be in the thick of it. Regular pet movement might be workable if all of the Summoner DPS was through the egi. However 75% comes from the Summoner themselves. This means every manual movement of the egi takes away from overall DPS. Add in the other changes that gimp the Summoner and you have a broken class that didn't need be broken.

It doesn't help at all that the Place command is kinda clunky. But yeah, given that two out of three egis are intended to remain in close quarters - and Titan in particular is DESIGNED to be taking near constant damage - SE's explanation for removing Sustain is kind of ludicrous. I'll admit that I didn't use it often myself in Heavensward - but this is because I had no need for Titan at all (overworld stuff was all too weak to require a tank Egi, and instanced stuff I usually used Garuda who rarely took damage), but it was still good to have.

While it might not be a traditional FF Summoner the HW version was working pretty smoothly. If SE didn't like that they should have come out a said we are going to work on changing the Summoner toward its more traditional interpretation and fully designed the new job. If they didn't have the resources to do it properly for SB then they should not have made major architectural changes to the job and done the minimum required to build up to level 70. In the end they would have had more satisfied customers and fewer complaints.

What I object to most is the fact that SE seems to be treating these criticisms like, "Eh, there are always complainers." While this bemused headshaking is justified for some of the noise made by the fanbase (such as the never-ending back-and-forth as to how difficult the Raids should be), I'm not sure the disappointment with Summoner is so clear-cut. If there's some super-secret way to play SMN that makes it competitive with RDM, or even with BLM, I don't think players have discovered it yet.

[Alberel]

What I object to most is the fact that SE seems to be treating these criticisms like, "Eh, there are always complainers." While this bemused headshaking is justified for some of the noise made by the fanbase (such as the never-ending back-and-forth as to how difficult the Raids should be), I'm not sure the disappointment with Summoner is so clear-cut. If there's some super-secret way to play SMN that makes it competitive with RDM, or even with BLM, I don't think players have discovered it yet.

It's not just SE. Half the posts in this thread are people with no clue about SMN coming in and dismissing any arguments about the job's current state. A lot of people seem to have convinced themselves that SMNs have no legitimate reason to complain about anything because they've been forced to fight tooth and nail to get any attention from the devs since 2.0.

[Dyvid]

- Nobody asked for more Ruin and less DoT management. That was SE's idea to simplify the job

Okay, then explain to the community why everyone in 3.0 used Garuda over Ifrit? Their DPS was the same so what made Garuda more prized?

- I can't speak to the rationale for the hugely, big Bahamut as I've never seen those requests. I can say being around for about 2 years I don't recall seeing a request for bigger egi's but I also wasn't historically a big reader of the forums.

You must not have been reading the DPS boards then because it's been a complaint since SMN came out.

- There aren't any complaints about getting the Devotion buff. It is the half assed implementation based on one target's proximity to our pet. It is obvious someone decided they needed something for utility as an afterthought.

There are but it's drowned out by complaints about SMN damage and design. Actually feedback is being lost in the crowd.

It's not just SE. Half the posts in this thread are people with no clue about SMN coming in and dismissing any arguments about the job's current state. A lot of people seem to have convinced themselves that SMNs have no legitimate reason to complain about anything because they've been forced to fight tooth and nail to get any attention from the devs since 2.0.

Oh there is definitely reason for legit complaints, as long as legitimate. Right now based on parser and flogs SMN is the lost dps caster but doesn't account for buffs/debuffs as smn damage and is ignored by those sources. People are using Garuda because the magic debuff gives them a visible damage increase, it's something tangible were as things like Radiant Shields and Devotion make it harder to tell if the damage decrease is worth the buffs.

[SendohJin]

Okay, then explain to the community why everyone in 3.0 used Garuda over Ifrit? Their DPS was the same so what made Garuda more prized?

how did Ifrit match a Raging Strikes + Dreadwyrm Trance + Tri-disaster Bane on trash pulls?

and you can prefer less DoTs and less Ruin. would much rather see lower potencies and more frequent Aetherflow stacks.

it's also possible to have more detailed egis without them being bigger.

[Angry_Evil]

Okay, then explain to the community why everyone in 3.0 used Garuda over Ifrit? Their DPS was the same so what made Garuda more prized?

Contagion extended RS DWT dots = DPS increase. Obviously. Also no, ifrit has more DPS actually. I used mostly ifrit through whole 3.2+ btw lol. And was doing fine and usually better than any other smn with garuda.
Are you really arguing that community finding a certain way to play a job SE designed = community feedback about wanting more ruin and less DoTs? That's insane... People just did what gave them most DPS, that's all....

You must not have been reading the DPS boards then because it's been a complaint since SMN came out.

It is no excuse for poor implementation of bahamut. Option to change size should've been there on release. I don't see how you can blame summoners for that. Wanting bigger\better looking summons doesn't mean people wanted unreasonable things. Actually it's very reasonable. On the other hand poor implementation and proceeding handling of that WAS unreasonable. Poor communication and whatnot

There are but it's drowned out by complaints about SMN damage and design. Actually feedback is being lost in the crowd.

You can't prove that anything is being lost in the crowd. And complains about SMN 4.0 design and damage are just as viable as anything else. When "complains about complains" are not viable at all.