Quote Originally Posted by Taranok View Post
Because the devs are working within a framework that is beyond what we, as customers, can see. The devs hate Egis as much as we do, and they're desperately trying to find a way to make Summoner feel like Summoner as much as we want them to. But things will hamper this. For instance, Arcanist lore makes it difficult to get rid of Egis. Aetherflow is kind of ingrained into Summoner and Arcanist both at a lore and gameplay level. The devs need to find ways to keep these various disparate bits intact, which leads to SMN feeling awful because of it.

The best thing to happen to Machinist was when the devs legitimately treated the class as no longer being sacred, but profane, and started gutting it, even going so far as to remove an ability from a class quest that was core to the class, Gauss Barrel. And look how much better MCH is now for it. SMN needs the same treatment but it's not a decision to be taken lightly to literally gut core features to the lore. But that's what Summoner needs as well if they are to turn it into a proper summoner, and the devs just are trying to work within the framework they already have instead of treating it as profane and not caring about what they do so long as the end results are where they want the class to be.
The difference between Summoner and Machinist is that feedback on Machinist was generally aligned. Within Summoner there are two distinct camps. Those that like the job itineration and have played it for a long time despite its shortfalls and those that hate it and want something they call "a real summoner" and don't play it currently. The lore of XIV prevents what is referred to as "a real summoner" being implemented. I place "Real Summoner" in quotations as it seems to differ from person to person. While the current itineration has its problems, I think it is a step in the right direction same as the trances were a step in the right direction. But then I sit in the former camp and like how it is currently.

I think it boils down to the fact that the two design notions are impossible to fully align, therefore we get a bit of both in the current design. I think no matter what the devs do, they cannot please everyone, and it wouldn't be fair to fundamentally change the job, based on the wishes of those who don't play it. So taking the spirit of both ideas, for me, is the right approach.

That said, I do think there is a fundamental issue with the flow of the current job and I think it is caused by the phasic nature of its combined elements. On their own, each element works well and feels fine, but when combined, make the class feel clunky, and have a broken flow. At its core, the job is difficult and complex to play due to its myriad o elements that have short cooldowns and need to be tracked and stranger still is that the job gets a little easier to play at level 80 than it was at 72-79 which I think is a problem albeit one of lesser pertinence.