[ Dev Requests ] Player Suggestions for Future Summoner Reworks

[Kindled]

The focus of this thread is to discuss what people think (especially those who main or have played summoner extensively) should change with summoner in upcoming expansions and patches.

Please share your ideas and comment on others. Just be respectful.

[Kindled]

My desire is to see summoner return a unique and worthy role representing the legacy of the Final Fantasy franchise. I've played summoner since 2.0, mostly as a main, and I can honestly say that I have never liked the DoT management involved. These abilities have always made it feel like it was designed after the Warlock class from World of Warcraft rather than something from the Final Fantasy universe. However, I do concede that these abilities have allowed summoner to somewhat shine as the more mobile caster option, which I do enjoy.

Another post I read really got me thinking, and recently Square Enix has revealed some fairly awesome stuff!



Final Fantasy XVI really shined in its showcase as the protagonist employed his adopted Eikon powers in a fast paced combat style. If FFXIV could rework summoner, possibly moving away from its traditional role in the franchise, it sure seems like we could be sitting on an vastly different and extremely fun class.

I think adopting a similar styles for the Eorzean summoner could really work since the devs seem to desire and prefer class ability with quick and momentary graphical effects, such as Enkindle or Aetherpact, rather than allowing summoners to maintain a large summon such as Bahamut.

No doubt this is because of the stress it places on servers and gameplay. However, it doesn't need to be mutually exclusive. Both could also be incorporated as well! A small summon to fight alongside its summoner who jumps into the fray employing the wrested aether won in their deadly battles against the Primals.

This seems like it would also give the devs a lot more freedom in how they could build the class. Currently, playing summoner feels like a chore maintaining DoTs and spamming ruin.

However, this isn't to say I don't love certain things about the current summoner. It is obvious that the devs have put in massive amounts of hard work into their past reworks of summoner, which has been evident throughout every expansion. Truly, I can only imagine that they are sick and tired of the massive reworks summoner has required and don't want to look at it again, but here's to hope!

What do you all think or suggest?

[Raikai]

I'll list in both a mix of what I hope and what I expect to happen:

1) Egis/Carbys are going to remain as just cosmetic companions - don't get me wrong, I enjoy the idea of pets... But if XIV current tech/code/whatever doesn't allow it to function properly, better have them off. They are barely fully-functional to begin with, anyways.

2) SMN will focus on rotating through 3 different Trance phases: Shiva > Ramuh > Phoenix (maybe differet summons, those are just my hopes). The trance ends with summoning the Demi to appear, perform a flashy hit and leave. The Dreadwyrm trance will be the fourth trance that only happens once you get through every trance once, and it's like the "burst phase"... It ends with Demi-Bahamut in the same fashion of performing Akh Morn and leaving.

3) Since it's a heavy rework, maybe they'll have to go retroactively through some of the SMN quests to adjust some elements of the story, since they are tied with the obtainable spells;

4) For a little added dash of flavor to this "classical summoner vision", their LB3 will change to summon Leviathan instead. Or any other of the big-sized primals.

[Kindled]

2) SMN will focus on rotating through 3 different Trance phases: Shiva > Ramuh > Phoenix (maybe differet summons, those are just my hopes). The trance ends with summoning the Demi to appear, perform a flashy hit and leave. The Dreadwyrm trance will be the fourth trance that only happens once you get through every trance once, and it's like the "burst phase"... It ends with Demi-Bahamut in the same fashion of performing Akh Morn and leaving.

I like what you are saying here. It would be a great way to feel more like an actual summoner since it doesn't seem like we will ever get the traditional summoning magic of this franchise. I'll go further and add that I hope the Aetherpact abilities will allow us both destructive single target damage as well as a mechanic giving us more control over the Aetherpacts, such as the ability to select where the AoE area will cast.

An additional suggestion might be to add more abilities that are more representative of the trance. The phoenix trance does this well! Fountain of Fire and Brand of Purgatory feel amazing to cast! In contrast, the dreadwyrm trace spams ruin spells. Perhaps it should be incorporated with summoning Bahamut while adopting a more representative filler ability like phoenix trance.

Don't make the summons do all the damaging work for me. I want to cast my own spells, and have my summon be a patner to supplement my damage, not have it be the entirety of my interaction with the target.

This is true also. Having a summoner totally reliant on its summon is terribly boring. It brings to mind how summoner plays in Phantasy Star Online 2. (Not fun)

Like I said I do LIKE smn having dots be a part of its identity (because wha tis a pet but a dot who's your friend?) but I'd like to see them get an upgrade in the next expansion like whm got their dps abilities updated in ShB to be more in-line with their class. Something like we see in Bozja spoilers where you send out a spell of tempering/corruption. Because the poison aesthetic is kinda misplaced after arcanist.

I just really wished they would do away with them entirely. I understand a lot of people like them, but the current DoT abilities feel more like they should be part of another class specializing in ailment upkeep, such as Oracle from FF Tactics.

[Roda]

The biggest two for me:
1, don't take away me fighting alongside my carbuncle companion. I like pet casters. Having a familiar is important to me. Don't let imperfect execution scare you into thinking it can't ever work. Pet classes are a staple to mmos, and removing that niche would be a misstep for xiv imo.
2, Don't make the summons do all the damaging work for me. I want to cast my own spells, and have my summon be a patner to supplement my damage, not have it be the entirety of my interaction with the target.

Now for the more nitty-gritty stuff.

• Resource managment and dot management is fun but the way current summoner goes about it is kinda really backwards? Summons are all just on cooldown timers that are 100% passive to your engagement with the rotation. There is ZERO thought put into using your big summons outside of managing ghosting. The most engaging challenge to playing summoner right now is just ruin 4 managment which is just an allowance to move without losing DPS and to spend in bahamut phase to avoid using ruin 2 for weaving. The gameplay is fun, but the identity is confused.
• Having different pet summons for different situations is fun! But I think "single target" vs "AoE" vs "I give you a shield and waste a ruin IV and do no damage" is a pretty weak implementation of it. I'd rather have my carbuncle selection be based off of utility and supporting my group instead of me noticing if there's 3 or more monsters in a cluster at once. Something like we were doing in stormblood with garuda buffing magic damage and ifrit buffing physical. I think there's a lot of potential with that design philosophy. (bonus points if your pet choice changes how you interact with your -big summon- abilities!) ((all I'm saying is I want to summon a melee dps carbuncle and then go into odin trance and wield zantetsuken :P))
• I want a proper tanking pet again dangit! I want it to be able to hold agro for me, I want to have to manage it a bit and I want to be able to heal it! Pet casters are fun!
• Not only have more egi glamours, but give us quests, hidden quests even with puzzles, to go find and earn them! Let me use my class to interact with the world and get cool effects that affect the expression of my character. It is an RPG after all, and you don't have to limit a job to get cool fluffy flavor.
• Y'all never think big enough for the LB3 rework. Summon both hydaelyn and zodiark for the lb3. Cmon. (or maybe just randomly choose between the available primals. I'd like to summon alexander too lmao)
• Like I said I do LIKE smn having dots be a part of its identity (because wha tis a pet but a dot who's your friend?) but I'd like to see them get an upgrade in the next expansion like whm got their dps abilities updated in ShB to be more in-line with their class. Something like we see in Bozja spoilers where you send out a spell of tempering/corruption. Because the poison aesthetic is kinda misplaced after arcanist.
• another thing with dots is that I actually didn't mind fester ruins in that I liked that dot management interacted with the other parts of our rotation instead of "is dot applied? if no, apply dot" I'd like to see dots have a similar interaction with a gauge as BRD dots or DNC esprit. (probably something building to the big summons)

I made a rage concept of what I wish smn was back at the start of ShB when SMN was physically painful to play. Maybe I'll give it another pass and post it again here.

[Exodus-E]

What do you all think or suggest?

I think they should keep the Egis around.
Better yet: they should implement more to be applied/changed through a dedicated UI window (instead of text commands).

On a related note, and after all these years, I'm real sick of people wanting to outright remove them under the pretense of "not being like past FF games" (like SCH or DRK currently are, amirite?).
All while ignoring the established lore set up by this game's universe.

Implement more Trances/Demi-Summons? Fair enough.
Removing Egis? Absolutely not.

The biggest two for me:
1, don't take away me fighting alongside my carbuncle companion. I like pet casters. Having a familiar is important to me. Don't let imperfect execution scare you into thinking it can't ever work. Pet classes are a staple to mmos, and removing that niche would be a misstep for xiv imo.
2, Don't make the summons do all the damaging work for me. I want to cast my own spells, and have my summon be a patner to supplement my damage, not have it be the entirety of my interaction with the target.

Agreed 100%.
They should simply improve on what's already there, as well as implement more pets (even if they're just cosmetics).

[Raikai]

Implement more Trances/Demi-Summons? Fair enough.
Removing Egis? Absolutely not.

So, then the SMN (and SCH for some of that matter) will be eternally cursed with this clunky gameplay because the devs can't make pets work optimally? I do hope they get rid of Egis play-wise not because I hate them, or because I don't think egi lore is worse than the 'classical summoner' thing, but simply because it doesn't work well.

If somehow they would announce "Hey we upgraded the game's code and now pets can be reworked!" then I'd be all for it... But if they cannot, I'd rather have SMN go to another direction.

[Exodus-E]

So, then the SMN (and SCH for some of that matter) will be eternally cursed with this clunky gameplay because the devs can't make pets work optimally? I do hope they get rid of Egis play-wise not because I hate them, or because I don't think egi lore is worse than the 'classical summoner' thing, but simply because it doesn't work well.

If somehow they would announce "Hey we upgraded the game's code and now pets can be reworked!" then I'd be all for it... But if they cannot, I'd rather have SMN go to another direction.

That's what I meant with my "improve on what's already there", yeah.
I merely take offense on those who want stuff removed (based on their own "ideal" image of a given thing) instead of finding a way to further adjust/fix what we currently have.

[Raikai]

That's what I meant with my "improve on what's already there", yeah.
I merely take offense on those who want stuff removed (based on their own "ideal" image of a given thing) instead of finding a way to further adjust/fix what we currently have.

That would honestly be the best case scenario but I'm not really holding my breath with sphagetti code improvements. Actually I was, sorta, since Yoshi-P implied (or at least that was my understanding) in one of the interviews not long ago that something "big" would be coming to the game's structure. Something inside of me thought that it was honestly a code improvement, so they could bypass many things (sometimes even simple things) that they can't do because of it.

But alas it we didn't have anything like that in the announcement... Unless it's something they're unvealing just in May.

[Kindled]

I think they should keep the Egis around.
Better yet: they should implement more to be applied/changed through a dedicated UI window (instead of text commands).

On a related note, and after all these years, I'm real sick of people wanting to outright remove them under the pretense of "not being like past FF games" (like SCH or DRK currently are, amirite?).
All while ignoring the established lore set up by this game's universe.

Implement more Trances/Demi-Summons? Fair enough.
Removing Egis? Absolutely not.


Agreed 100%.
They should simply improve on what's already there, as well as implement more pets (even if they're just cosmetics).

True, I would prefer if they kept the egis included, but maybe change their models to fit how the game has progressed since 2.0.

Additionally, hopefully they can further develop the Egi Assault abilities so we can actually place the AoEs ourselves. I don't mind managing my pets as long as it doesn't take away too much from the damage. Although, this might be an unpopular desire since many people don't like the micromanaging involved.