Thread: Summoner changes that should happen onto 7.0

Originally Posted by fulminating

It’s less cherrypicked, and dungeons are a set of sets which should make the average more robust than a specifically chosen alliance raid that isn’t even the same position in the series - at least show copied factory and puppet’s bunker too to try and establish your trend.

I would argue that dungeons aren't as regularly parsed content, though, because they're so trivial. In addition, they reflect a very different set of selection pressures, since AoE and speed is the name of the game just for the sake of clear speed efficiency. Dungeons, by in large, are a chore people do for leveling and roulettes and nothing more. It isn't really content people specifically seek out to engage in. Trials probably have more use than dungeons in that regard, especially extreme trials. Also, were you including all dungeons, or just max-level ones? Because we've already discussed that sub-max-level content is hardly representative, or useful. It's something to be gotten through, not a goal in and of itself.

As for the a-raid, the position in the series really shouldn't matter much, and I don't really see why you think it would. The difference would reflect more on patch-to-patch job changes than it would anything else. In any case:

Puppets Bunker - 7th in rank for parses, 8.2% of all DPS parses
Copied Factory - 7th in rank for parses, 8.5% of all DPS parses

So the ranking stayed basically the same across the 3 tiers of the a-raid, right around ~8.5%. And now it's at 14%.

Originally Posted by fulminating

As previously mentioned, the button that lets you view the entire tier didn’t seem to work on the Eden’s promise parses, which is why it was omitted. If you go and check verse or earlier then change that setting it shows a comparable amount.

Verse admittedly has Summoner rather higher (and quite a few more parses overall, so your claim there seems to bear out), placing 2nd for number of parses with 13% of the total parses. But that's only just below what it is now, in Asphod, and that's despite there being 1 additional DPS compared to Shadowbringers. If we look specifically at 5.3, Summoner is at 5th place with 10.4% of the parses.

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Originally Posted by fulminating

There’s a dichotomy on whether jobs are coherent at 50, which largely seems defined by when they were introduced. As with a lot of issues, shadowbringers and onwards reworks or introductions seem to neglect all but the end game.

I'd argue that at level 50, Black Mage (no Fire IV or Blizzard IV, nor Enochian or Umbral Hearts), Paladin (missing literally their entire magic segment, as well as Sword Oath), Dragoon (they don't even get their full 5-part combo by 50, much less all of their jumps and Life of the Dragon), Bard (they literally only have 2 of their 3 songs), and White Mage (no Lilies, they're basically just Cure II bots at 50) are all extremely hollow on core job mechanics at 50. Some of those trickle in by 60, but most don't come until 70+.

Meanwhile Samurai has basically their entire core GCD kit at 50, missing only their oGCDs and Kenki system. Red Mages lack their spell followups, as well as one of their two oGCDs and their AoE spender, but they have their core mana sequence and their melee combo at 50. Machinists lack 2 of their 3 big hit abilities (and the one they have, Hot Shot which becomes Air Anchor, deals less than half its ultimate potency, though it still generates battery), but they have their full GCD combo, Hypercharge, both of the oGCDs that Hypercharge leans into, and Wildfire. Astrologians have their full card system, including Redraw, Astrodyne, and the Sign system that feeds it. They lack most of their oGCD cooldowns, but their base kit is pretty much there.

And that's specifically what I mean when I say there's a difference. Some jobs have at least their core central mechanic defined fairly early on, while other jobs don't even see that mechanic until 70+. The central defining aspect of Paladins is the back-and-forth between their physical phase and their casting phase, but they don't even have a casting phase until 68 when they finally get Requiescat. Dragoons are defined by their Life of the Dragon sequence and their every-minute-burst that accompanies it, but they don't get Life of the Dragon until 70, and it takes until 64 before they even have their full 5-part melee combo. To be honest, of the original 2.0 jobs that haven't been completely reworked in the last couple expansions (ie. Monk and Summoner), Warrior and maybe Scholar are the only ones that have a sufficient amount of their core mechanics at 50 to be on level with most of the expansion jobs. Reaper is, imo, the exception rather than the rule, for expansion jobs. Most of them are much more fleshed out at 50 than 2.0 jobs, though even those expansion jobs should have, imo, more of their core kit at 50.

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And to be frank, it angers me greatly that Reapers ended up that way. There's no bloody reason for it. It would have been just as effective a design to give Reapers Blood Stalk + Gallows at 30, Soul Slice and Guillotine between there and 50, Enshroud at 50 with only Cross Reaping and 3 orbs instead of 5, Grim Reaping somewhere between 50 and 60, Gibbet and Void Reaping at 60 or 70, Gluttony at the other of the two, as well as a bump to 5 orbs somewhere in there, and then the rest of the progression basically as is. Now the job has the core of its main mechanics at 50, with both the Soul and Shroud gauge and the Enshroud phase, and that mechanic gets improved and extended as level increases, rather than introduced whole cloth at much higher levels. Reaper at level 50 feels like a level ~30-40 Dragoon, you have a 1-2-3, a single debuff to maintain every 30s, and a single oGCD you get to use every 5 melee attacks and...that's it, literally. It'd be as if Red Mages had nothing but Jolt, Verthunder, and Veraero until 60-70, or if Samurai didn't even get their Sen and Iaijutsu system until 60-70, or if Machinists were just 1-2-3 bots with Gauss Round on occasion and neither gauge.

Originally Posted by fulminating

The way they went on about the damage to attack feature and how it is a less functional Selene/eos came across badly, the very copypasted nature of some heals also sat badly when they have the darkside mechanic that could have been used as a pseudo diurinal/nocturnal so ast wouldn’t have had to lose more of its identity

How is it "less functional" than Selene/Eos? It heals for roughly the same amount, but instead of being entirely passive, it specifically drives you to be using your GCDs on attacks rather than dps-loss GCD heals. And unlike Selene/Eos, you can pick who it heals. And all of your oGCDs and such are centered on you rather then wherever that ADD fairy fluttered off to this time. I agree that their kit very clearly come across as "here are the Scholar spells, let's make Sage versions of them", but then they started deviating in pretty considerable ways. Toxikon and Phlegma have no equivalent for Scholars, and the Addersgall system has, imo, the best features of the Lily system and the Aethercharge system, being passively regenerated (but with an active gen on a CD, too), but spent on a bunch of different oGCDs rather than just "your main GCD ST/AoE heal, but instant and it doesn't cost DPS". Haima and Panhaima are very unique mechanics, and most of the cooldown oGCDs have at least two effects (healing and something else, like a DR buff or healing+ buff), and they can be comboed very effectively. Krasis -> Physis II -> Kerachole is a shockingly effective sequence that's available basically every trash pull in a dungeon, giving you ~300p of HoT healing every 3s on top of your ~225p Kardia healing, for the first ~15s of the fight.

Originally Posted by Kaedys

<continued 2>.
How is it "less functional" than Selene/Eos? It heals for roughly the same amount, but instead of being entirely passive, it specifically drives you to be using your GCDs on attacks rather than dps-loss GCD heals. And unlike Selene/Eos, you can pick who it heals. And all of your oGCDs and such are centered on you rather then wherever that ADD fairy fluttered off to this time. I agree that their kit very clearly come across as "here are the Scholar spells, let's make Sage versions of them", but then they started deviating in pretty considerable ways. Toxikon and Phlegma have no equivalent for Scholars, and the Addersgall system has, imo, the best features of the Lily system and the Aethercharge system, being passively regenerated (but with an active gen on a CD, too), but spent on a bunch of different oGCDs rather than just "your main GCD ST/AoE heal, but instant and it doesn't cost DPS". Haima and Panhaima are very unique mechanics, and most of the cooldown oGCDs have at least two effects (healing and something else, like a DR buff or healing+ buff), and they can be comboed very effectively. Krasis -> Physis II -> Kerachole is a shockingly effective sequence that's available basically every trash pull in a dungeon, giving you ~300p of HoT healing every 3s on top of your ~225p Kardia healing, for the first ~15s of the fight.

Kardia is annoyingly less functional than Selene/eos because it requires weave windows to swap your target whereas eos will just do it for you, SCH also benefits from totem healing with the fairy, the fact that seraph is as powerful ability as it is and it lets you totem heal makes SCH far more useful than SGE in the majority of situations

And while SGE has a lot of unique heals not a lot of them are terribly functional, the pulsing shield combo is interesting but usually just amounts to “10% mitigation with shield 1 plus 600 potency heal from shields 2-5 expiring”, holos is strangely designed with the heal being upfront in an AOE situation which is kinda backwards for AOE, pneuma being a HOT is such a stupid design decision I have no idea why they did that and we have a whole thread dedicated to how useless Pepsis is

SCH also has the mother of all abilities in this game, deployment tactics, nothing comes close to it

It’s strange SGE looks designed better on paper and 100% plays better (I maimed SGE this tier) but once you delve even a millimeter under the surface SCH just kinda does everything SGE wants to do better and retains some measure of complexity with its decision making gameplay around aetherflow, seraph, aetherpact and dissipation

Originally Posted by Supersnow845

And while SGE has a lot of unique heals not a lot of them are terribly functional

I'll grant you that Pepsis is largely useless, but some of the others are a bit questionable of objections. Pneuma isn't a HoT, it directly heals the entire 600p on cast. Not sure where you got the idea that it's a HoT, but go lob it at a striking dummy. Instant ~12-13k heal.

For Haima/Panhaima, the latter (the AoE version) often does end up healing with some of the stacks, but I've almost never had Haima expire naturally. Tanks get auto'd plenty often enough to consume the stacks. It's remarkably effective against trash pulls in dungeons, since it effectively gives a total of ~30k in shielding over the 5 stacks. And Panhaima is basically cheat mode against party DoT damage, ~20k in shielding on everyone in the party. It can often just straight negate the DoT effect entirely.

As for Kardia, yes it requires a weave window to swap, but Sages have plenty of weave windows (all healers do now, tbh), and unlike Selene/Eos, that lets you pick your passive healing target. I still see it as a superior design. Holos is a bit strange. Personally, I'd prefer it have an Excog-like effect, but that might actually make it too strong. Still, a 10% DR that stacks with Kerachole is hard to say no to, even if the healing ends up largely wasted (though I guess it helps top people off before the AoE hit).

Do Scholars actually use Dissipation? Last I heard it was more of a joke ability than anything else, since it locks you out of all of the fairy-based abilities for the duration and only buffs GCD healing (despite granting full stacks for your oGCDs). It's 30s of no fairy healing at all, in exchange for a 20% buff to the heals you really don't want to be using if you can avoid it and essentially a bonus set of 3 Aetherflow. Also not sure how much decision-making really exists for Aetherpact. There's only one use for that gauge, and the income for it is pretty fixed (30 per minute, unless you use Dissipation and then sit on the Aetherflow stacks until it's over). It's just another healing cooldown with a bit more flexible timing.

Also, probably my main gripe with Scholar is the fact that Energy Drain exists, because it means every single usage of an Aetherflow stack on a heal is -100p of damage. It adds a certain element of decision-making to usage, but it also just feels bad when I have to blow Aetherflow on healing instead of more deeps. Sage doesn't have that problem. In fact, they have if anything the opposite. Their entire MP model is built around using those Addersgall charges, so they sometimes find themselves in a situation of dropping an Addersgall on Druochole on a full or near-full target just to burn a charge so the recharge keeps rolling.

Originally Posted by Kaedys

I'll grant you that Pepsis is largely useless, but some of the others are a bit questionable of objections. Pneuma isn't a HoT, it directly heals the entire 600p on cast. Not sure where you got the idea that it's a HoT, but go lob it at a striking dummy. Instant ~12-13k heal.

For Haima/Panhaima, the latter (the AoE version) often does end up healing with some of the stacks, but I've almost never had Haima expire naturally. Tanks get auto'd plenty often enough to consume the stacks. It's remarkably effective against trash pulls in dungeons, since it effectively gives a total of ~30k in shielding over the 5 stacks. And Panhaima is basically cheat mode against party DoT damage, ~20k in shielding on everyone in the party. It can often just straight negate the DoT effect entirely.

As for Kardia, yes it requires a weave window to swap, but Sages have plenty of weave windows (all healers do now, tbh), and unlike Selene/Eos, that lets you pick your passive healing target. I still see it as a superior design. Holos is a bit strange. Personally, I'd prefer it have an Excog-like effect, but that might actually make it too strong. Still, a 10% DR that stacks with Kerachole is hard to say no to, even if the healing ends up largely wasted (though I guess it helps top people off before the AoE hit).

Do Scholars actually use Dissipation? Last I heard it was more of a joke ability than anything else, since it locks you out of all of the fairy-based abilities for the duration and only buffs GCD healing (despite granting full stacks for your oGCDs). It's 30s of no fairy healing at all, in exchange for a 20% buff to the heals you really don't want to be using if you can avoid it and essentially a bonus set of 3 Aetherflow. Also not sure how much decision-making really exists for Aetherpact. There's only one use for that gauge, and the income for it is pretty fixed (30 per minute, unless you use Dissipation and then sit on the Aetherflow stacks until it's over). It's just another healing cooldown with a bit more flexible timing.

Also, probably my main gripe with Scholar is the fact that Energy Drain exists, because it means every single usage of an Aetherflow stack on a heal is -100p of damage. It adds a certain element of decision-making to usage, but it also just feels bad when I have to blow Aetherflow on healing instead of more deeps. Sage doesn't have that problem. In fact, they have if anything the opposite. Their entire MP model is built around using those Addersgall charges, so they sometimes find themselves in a situation of dropping an Addersgall on Druochole on a full or near-full target just to burn a charge so the recharge keeps rolling.

Pneuma is designed as a one tick massive HOT, it’s why it tends to hit people at slightly different times (making it terrible for clutch healing) and the fact that it cannot proc divine veil like a normal GCD heal would

Kardia swapping is fine but it’s just pointless busywork for what eos does for free, like a raidwide goes out, fey blessing heals half the damage then eos just heals the rest naturally rather than forcing you to swap to each target, plus if you need to heal someone specifically with eos aetherpact is far superior to soteria

Dissipation is actually one of the strongest abilities in SCH’s kit and that’s because it buffs deployment tactics, the aetherflow you get from dissipation are meant to be a refund for using a GCD shield to deploy, the additional shield the dissipation buff gives over the normal shield size is stronger than any shield SGE provides outside of Zoe, plus SCH can buff it with protraction, fey illumination and other party single target buffs, that shield can straight up ignore savage mechanics

And yeah aetherflow discouraging healing is good to me, I’d rather have to make decisions on my healing and organise my resources (like how can I maximise my fairy skills) rather than dump over 60% of my addersgall into druachole to maintain a mana economy I really don’t need to maintain anyway because SGE’s mana economy is so strong even without druachole mana management. SGE just having endless free healing with no decisions attached (AST and WHM are the same) is one of my biggest problems with current healer design

I think that you might be conflating coherent and complete, which is a fair thing to do. Paladin is a good point, it'd be nice to see some magic introduced a bit earlier, however they do have the majority of their physical/dot rotation established by that point. White mage was gutted reworked in shadowbringers which is where a lot of the current issues seemingly started to manifest. I disagree on dragoon - while it doesn't have wheeling/fc, it does have the basic dot/stab/stab/stab rotation, which develops into dot/stab/stab and finally dot/stab as you level, similarly black mage has the underlying concept of the job there (fire for damage, ice for recovery), with fire 4 being exactly the kind of simple yet interesting change to the rotation that more jobs need. Bard, yep wanderer's should be the 50 skill and battle voice 52, but it is what it is.

Most of the jobs you call out as being good - mch and ast excluded - are from earlier than shadowbringers, and haven't been reworked extensively. Mch despite having a lot of its kit, doesn't really cement its identity until drill shows up, and let's not pretend there's no issues with having a selfish physical ranged. I think the card system is probably ast's saving grace, allowing it to have more involvement at lower levels because it can't really be introduced piecemeal. Again, though this is a heavensward job which means it has to level from 30 rather than 60 or 70.

Sage being scholar2 completely removes it from the discussion because it is very much from the "can I copy your homework/sure but change it up a little" school. I don't really understand why the voidsent stuff is limited to being so late either, it's pretty much the core theme of the job. If they didn't want to give the full potency attacks or bother with rarely seen animations, an "enhanced voidsent" trait would have been more than fine. I'd probably have stuck first enshroud at 60 if it were up to me with a greatly reduced ability to enter it. I'd probably also remove shadow of death, and have whorl apply a fall off, similar to expacion because there's a few parts of the reaper kit that just feel weirdly bloated.

Toxicon's a hard one - it does use the resources and depending on number of targets works out as a slightly better or worse art of war/movement tool, but setting it up for use is a bit of a faff because noone likes gcd healing. Phlegma is essentially an ogcd plenary medica baked into a glare, for a two minute cooldown it just felt a bit underwhelming. Since we're comparing it to scholar, I have to talk about expedient, which I prefer even if the sprint's now only 10s. Apples and oranges and all that. Haima/panhaima feel a bit like they're on the gimmicky side to me. I'd probably rather have fey union than haima, but I guess for akh morns panhaima is almost tailor-made. The skills emitting from the faerie are one of scholar's strengths, not a weakness. With the use of the place pet action you can extend the range of your healing actions noticeably, and it will continue healing in the event you do need to hardcast heals. Unless you already told the faerie to do a different faerie action. I mean personal preference will factor into it, and there's nothing wrong with liking sage more. I just can't help but feel we're discussing this in the wrong subforum that it doesn't quite do what it set out to.

Does the same not apply to alliance raids? Puppet's bunker had a lot more aoe in between bosses than algaia for example. Another thing worth noting is that (as with dungeons) they're not necessarily done for fun, but for glamour and the weekly coin. As a result jobs that enable netflix on another monitor may be chosen more frequently than others that are more involved.

Before everyone gets all on the DoT train, there was a technical reason SE was trying to limit the number of DoTs jobs have access to. There is a hard limit on the number of effects a monster is able to have on it at any given time. It was found out during Eureka and Hunts that this limit was being hit and players were left unable to land effects. For jobs like SMN this meant if you missed the window to get your DoTs in before the limit was hit, you were missing a large portion of your DPS. It is incredibly unlikely that regular content mobs will have this problem but still, jobs should be able to function in all content.