To start off, I've been playing SMN as main since release... or at least since however long after release it took me to get to 30. And since then I like most have been waiting for new egi's, 4 expansions later and still nothing but a practically worthless "glamour" system, however with the pet changes I feel like they now have the opportunity for something better.
Let's be honest, with the way they work now egi's could pretty much not exist. They have a single weak auto attack and then all their other uses are ogcd skills we have to use anyway so, why not scrap them?
Instead of Egi assault 1/2 and enkindle replace them with "demi assault 1/2/3" They added the perfect template for how SMN should work already, ironically on ninja, I'm talking of course about Hellfrog. Have demi assault 1/2/3 summon various demi primals for a single attack hellfrog style and the disappear. And since they seem to love the "evolving" skills lately you can do it any number of ways. Have the demi assault switch after use, demi assault 1 could be Garuda for first use, then it becomes demi Shiva, then demi Lakshmi, etc. That way we can get our new summons while not having a whole bunch of extra buttons. Or have what phase of your rotation switch it. Garuda in base, Shiva in DWT, Lakshmi after Bahamut phase.
The way the egi's work now I just feel like they should just remove them since they are just ogcds anyway and actually give us something different. I mean SMN feels kind of gypped this expansion, what did we get? We got Phoenix as a reskin of Bahamut and a pair of fire spells that replace our normal spells while in that phase. If they are going to give us a reskin as our main new toy at least give us more than just the one and reskin the rest for some other primals.
Also side note but with all the evolving skill traits I feel like it's a missed opportunity not to give a trait that evolves Physick into Demi Mog. Put it on a cooldown and make it an AOE, it would be better than the pointless heal on Phoenix.
Anyway I know I didn't really do a good job of getting my point across but i wanted to get my thoughts out there.
TLDR: Ditch Egi altogether and replace Egi assault 1/2 and enkindle with Hellfrog style demi summon attacks of various primals.