an idea for the egi system

[Tobias_Azuryon]

I feel like the SMN and the egi system needs a complete rework where we move away from this designated pet job and instead become an actual summoner, as in the act of summoning is part of our core rotation. As it stands now our job is in this weird in between phase of where the job used to be in ARR (focused on diseases, festering the diseases, and ruin) and what it's becoming (DWT, Bhamaut, Firebird). Even now our main mechanic aetherflow doesn't interact with DWT or summoning in any way. Part of the reason I think the job feels so bloated now is because it's trying to be both jobs at once, an arcanist and a summoner.

Like imagine instead of casting bio you instead summoned ifrit at the target who would attack for 30 seconds and serve the same purpose as the dot. And miasma would be a second summon like titan. And instead of festering the target to cause damage you could use egi assault. It would command both of them to attack exactly like fester does where it obviously does nothing if there are no summons out and is supposed to be cast when both are out for maximum damage. Imagine putting multiple dot/egi's on many targets and so you have multiple groups, possibly smaller models if needed, attacking your enemies. Bane could be this awesome spell that splits/summons forth a horde of egi's for each target required instead of just splitting up your diseases.

Kind of just had a bunch on inspirational ideas out of the blue as I was writing this. I might try to consolidate it all and start a rework idea thread later.

I agree with this.

Without more egis, and without meaningful choice in using the egis, and without the lag I don't understand why I should enjoy egi assaults in any ways. I know they don't like pet classes but I don't understand why you'd actively make a pet feel so terrible as Egi's do. Their terrible potencies, Ifrit having to be in melee range, and the fact that like you said Aetherflow doesn't fit in, it becomes a garbled mess. I liked when they made it where we could instant swap summons, but now I'm like "oh I have no reason to because it's just "hit one guy or hit a bunch" instead of any real change in skills.

SMN is three different systems being integrated minimally together, and none of them feel satisfying beyond Baha Blast and Phoenix Wright. I wish Egis fed into Bahamut and Phoenix to make that mean more, but right now SMN is littered with sub-100 potency skills AND a mix of like 3 different playstyles forced together. It sucks every time I try to go back to it lol. I noted it in a reddit post once but I was playing a bunch of Astral chain and watching the player roll around with the Legion Summon and do skills and damage was what I wish Summoner was, but right now the egis are just a waste of time/space without a substantial buff/redesign.