Inevitable Job Simplifications?

[tearagion]

People don't necessarily hate new summoner for what it is, but for what it took away.

Nah I hate it for what it is too. When RDM/RPR run absolute circles around you in nuance and flexibility, and tanks+ast have more involved rotations, maybe the DPS job in question is poorly designed. What it took away is what makes me upset in addition to hating the job.

[IDontPetLalas]

Nah I hate it for what it is too. When RDM/RPR run absolute circles around you in nuance and flexibility, and tanks+ast have more involved rotations, maybe the DPS job in question is poorly designed. What it took away is what makes me upset in addition to hating the job.

I wouldn't say that AST is more involved rotations than the current summoner. You may be thinking of the opener, but after that? No, not at all. With tanks, maybe you could make a case that they're comparable.

[tearagion]

I wouldn't say that AST is more involved rotations than the current summoner. You may be thinking of the opener, but after that? No, not at all. With tanks, maybe you could make a case that they're comparable.

I chose the word involved for a specific reason, cards alone require more consideration than anything in SMN's kit.

[Renathras]

It’s been going nowhere for the past 6 years lol. Yet people still ask for same things they asked for during previous expansions and never got (like BLM white mage, or wanting Scholar to become the Poison God of Plagues and Pestilence, remove all healing gcds and replace with oGCD, ‘skill ceilings’ that scale infinitely, etc ).

Also why is it so bad to like the new Summoner? It’s easy sure but in case people haven’t noticed that’s kind of the aim-of-the-game when it comes to ffxiv designs. Seems a little unfair to say ‘if you like new Summoner you’re just a brainless piece of shit who doesn’t deserve to play this game’. What about people who liked both?

EXACTLY! Hit the nail RIGHT on the head.

I actually DID like Old SMN and wish it was still in the game (it's why I mention Green Mage so much). It was clunky and a Frankenstein monster mess, but it worked and was kind of fun with the frankly ridiculous mobility, damage, and party utility it brought to the table.

I think people here have different definitions on what they mean when they say a job has 'depth', so really, the question I have is, what counts as 'depth'? What quantifies one job having more 'depth' than another?

There is also the flexibility, is that separate to 'depth' or is it a component of 'depth'?

Agreed. But it's also not just that.

We're now discussing whether or not a Job is "fine". "fine" doesn't actually require depth, it only requires the Job to be functional, and is an even lower bar than depth to meet. And what even IS depth and complexity? Nebulous terms that are easy to throw out, but difficult to define, making a kind of "kitchen sink" defense for one's position. It's impossible to counter a point that isn't defined...other than pointing out it isn't defined and so has no meaning in the first place.

Ignorance, hyperbole, and "misrepresentations"

1) Yes, you were. If you were coming up on a DWT and hadn't needed to use your Egi-Assaults for movement, you were forced to blow them now - AND if you were at 4 stacks of Further Ruin, to blow 1 of those first before each Egi-Assault to prevent overcapping on Further Ruin. You needed to use them since they were DPS gains and to get them ticking again while also refreshing to 4 stacks before DWT so that when you rolled into Bahamut you had 4 ready to go but didn't overcap on either Further Ruin (by using Egi-Assaults above 4 stacks) or on Egi-Assaults (by having them sit off CD). I'm not sure you played Old SMN, or if you did, that you remember it well/knew what you were doing if you genuinely believe this. Further, you HAD to go into DWT/FBT on strict timings. "Oh, there's a heavy movement phase in 25 seconds but I'm at the 1 min mark...guess I'm using FBT and all my instants right now anyway!" You absolutely had to use your instants during non-movement periods ALL THE TIME on Old SMN. And there was nothing wrong with that then, either. If the fight didn't demand you use them all for movement, it didn't. If your free movement DWT/FBT came up during low movement phases, well, they did and you had to use them. End of story.

2) Horse hockey. Not only are you dodging because you know your argument is wrong and you CAN'T defend it, now you're lying. I've not said New SMN is some well of depth. I've said New SMN is FINE. I've also said it has less depth and optimization (skill ceiling) than Old SMN. Pretty much everything I've said is either objectively true or is reasonably true. You won't engage on the points because you have no legs to stand on.

3) See 2. Also: This is an ad hominem fallacy.

4) What's clear is you didn't play or didn't know Old SMN at all: See (1). I gave actual EXAMPLES of how Old SMN works - something you've yet to do. I actually understood the Job, and how to maximize what it could pull out as well as the complete rotation cycle, something you've yet to demonstrate any knowledge of. And as I said, Old SMN was a great Job in terms of having a high level of flexibility. A position you hold, so telling me I'm wrong on the one thing I'm agreeing with you on seems very very odd. I'm not comparing their complexity - I've already said Old SMN was more complex - I'm comparing their functionality - an argument you're studiously avoiding because it doesn't fit your narrative. You keep trying to say depth and complexity, two things I haven't contested New SMN has far less of. FAR LESS of, not ZERO. It objectively has greater than zero, so you insisting it doesn't is you denying factual reality. It doesn't have as much as you want, and again, that's fine for you to say. It's fine for you to want more. But stop lying about it.

5) See (4)

6) Stop lying. New SMN is alright. It's not what you want. Just say this:

"New SMN is not what I want."

That's what you should be saying right now. Is that soooooo hard?

.

1) Because it "just works" is what makes it fine, actually. Depth is not required for a Job to be fine. WAR has almost no depth, too, but is fine.

2) Wrong. Even the Balance has noted there are optimizations for the Job. There just aren't many. But you missed the point - it doesn't require theorycrafters just to figure out what it should be doing (base rotation). I didn't mention the words optimize or "improve the rotation".

3) SMN doesn't play at all like BLU, rofl! If it did, you wouldn't be complaining about it... Of all the whoppers you've said so far, that's probably the worst. Final Fantasy games RARELY have "summons on the field". FF3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, Tactics, 9, 15 all had Summons that appeared, fired off a huge attack, and then left. That's actually the norm for how Summons work in the series. The Demi-type summons that come in and stick around for a short time fighting alongside the Summoner, like FF 12, 13, and arguably 10, though 10 could be the one example oh persistent ones since they would stay around until KOed. "summons on field" is actually the single most uncommon form of Summons in all of Final Fantasy lore and history.

Again, all you're spouting off is hyperbole, added with a health dose of lying - both about what I'm arguing (I'm not arguing that New SMN is a bastion of complexity and depth, and never have; I've said it has more than ZERO, which is true, and have said it has less than Old SMN did, which is also true) and about your knowledge. That level of deception is ill suited to having a text argument where the other person can just point to the very words you quoted to show you're lying.

You need to lay off they hyperbole and sweeping false statements. Again, just say this:

"New SMN is not what I want."

That's a true statement, and I'll fault no one for saying it.

...

Assuming you're asking in good faith:

1) My idea of "good/well designed" is if a Job isn't clunky and counterintuitive (Old PLD was clunky and counterintuitive, such as needing to drop Atonements), is understandable to general player bases (a more complex Job can still be well designed, but will be more niche, and it requires a lot to make sure the complexity is good and not clunk), works well within the combat system (e.g. doesn't work like a stationary turret in a game where encounters require lots of movement, or if it does, has tools to account for this), can complete the requirements of the role (agro and surviving hits, healing, and damage dealing, for Tanks/Healers/DPSers, respectively). The abilities should be internally consistent and flow between each other smoothly (no weird stutter step "rotations" or designed/required clipping and so on), and ideally the abilities should have interactions with each other within the kit. OPTIONALLY but generally a good idea, the abilities fit within the class lore and fantasy.

New SMN has the least clunk of just about any Job in the game, isn't at all counterintuitive, is easily understandable, works extremely well within the combat system (having lots of movement, a combat raise, a party buff, and fitting the current 2 min meta system), has satisfactory damage output for the mandatory Caster spot, the abilities make sense within the kit, the GCD system flows smoothly and interlocks perfectly in a full 2 Demi complete cycle, and Gemshine/Astral flow as well as the Primal refreshes on Demi use, which also smoothly slot in the oGCD use of the Aetherflow/Energy Drain system and Enkindle/Astral Flow under Bahamut/Phoenix. It also nails the class fantasy, having both huge Summons that come in and deliver strong attacks, semi-persistent summons that come and fight with you for a short amount of time, and a permanent pet. The only issues at all are that Carby needs SOMETHING else it can do (ideally, it should be separated from the Primal/Demi effects so it's always there) and that the Aetherflow system doesn't fit Summoner's class fantasy and seems entirely vestigial - but since removing it would just make SMN even less, it can stick around for now without bothering me too much, and it's hardly the most jarring "this doesn't make sense on this Job" thing in the game.

Thus New SMN meets the requirements of what makes a job good/well designed, per my perspective.

2) I didn't say it was hard. It wasn't understandable to most people. There was a LOT of nuance. The reason players - and sometimes Devs - were okay with SMN doing more top end damage than BLM despite also having party buffs and a combat Raise...was because it was rare to find anyone who COULD DO IT. Old SMN had arguably the highest skill ceiling in the game of any Job in ShB, and a higher one than BLM did. Proper use of Tri-Disaster, proper stocking of Ruin 4s before Bahamut, BEFORE the ShB changes, blowing even non-damaging oGCDs (like Virus) during Bahamut to maximize Wyrmwave casts, not to mention the danger of ghosting Egi-Assaults at high ping (and when they were oGCDs before made on the GCD in, what, 5.3 or so?) - it was probably the hardest Job in the game. Anyone cay say a Job "isn't/wasn't hard" - "BLM 'isn't hard', you just cast a few fire spells then a few ice spells, right?" - I don't know why people like making that "flex" so often. It was very likely the single hardest Job in the game at the time, it was definitely the hardest Caster. It was also one of the most punishing Jobs for having a KO since you lost all your resources and were completely disjointed from the rest of the party in terms of party buffs and burst resources. Though to be fair...that was even worse in SB, so there's that.

I didn't say "reading tooltips" was an "insurmountable barrier to entry". I'm saying you can read New SMN's tooltips and understand more or less how to play the Job optimally. Old SMN, you could read your tooltips and figure out how to play the Job...at about 50-60% capacity. Further, this doesn't discount my point:

New SMN is fine in this respect, too.

3) You can, but barely. It's still some of the least jank of any Job in the game, and it's not easy to do. I don't think I've ghosted any of them yet. Use them after the 1st and then 2nd Astral Impulse (Ruin III) and it isn't an issue. You want to contrast that to Old SMN's ghosting issues? Really?

3b)The flexibility it offers isn't "a joke". Again, if you stop using ridiculous hyperbole, I'll stop contesting you on it. It's not god tier, but it's still real flexibility, which makes it not "a joke".

3c) "3-4 casts/minute"? Wut? o.O

Do you mean 3-4 less than BLM or RDM? Do you mean less APM? Do you mean hotbar buttons that you press? At minimum, counting Gemshine, Astral Flow, DWT/FBT, Enkindle and Ruin 3 all as single buttons (despite them pulling double duty and Gemshine, Astral Flow, and Ruin 3 all taking on different effects that alter their use and parameters such as cast time and GCD/oGCD function), SMNs still use 11 buttons per minute, 12 if we count Searing Light every 2 mins. AGAIN: Hyperbole. Stop the hyperbole if you want a rational and reasonable discussion.

3c) HOW does it "no longer fit with its own lore"? What part of its lore is it violating? Like...be specific. They bind and summon Primals to smite their foes. They gather the residual Aether of Primals to do this. If you mean summing Louis against his will, Old SMN was already doing that. What is the LORE that it is not fitting?

3d) What are you talking about? Granted, you are probably using a SUPER narrow definition of "meaningful" as an adjective for development - probably because even you realize that the Job is quite open to additional "development" with no qualifiers. But even with such a qualifier, New SMN actually has more room for meaningful development than Old SMN did. Old SMN had basically forced the Devs' backs against a wall since it was the ARR SMN with various disparate pieces grafted on that didn't fit the original theme. Original SMN lore didn't support the idea of corrupted "Dreadwyrm" Aether or Deathflare, either. And there was no where logical for them to go.

Dev meeting on expanding ShB SMN into EW: "So...what do we add? Another DoT? Another Demi?" "We can add Alexander!" "Do we do it with another trance?" "Nah, that's too much like Phoenix." "Okay, we'll make it a stand alone summon that fights beside you but isn't part of a Trance." "No, that's what Bahamut does." "Well, we could make it different from Bahamut where it attacks based on the number of buttons you use, including oGCDs?" "No, we USED to have Bahamut do that, remember? It sucked. That's why we changed it." "Okay...well, I guess we can just give Egi-Assaults another charge each?" "And what, raise the cap on Further Ruin? Then people will just stock up 20 Ruin 4s and spend minutes of encounters spamming it, trivializing them." "Well...we could split Phoenix off of FBT and make FBT like DWT?" "Dude...no. We don't need more copypastes." "Well...maybe we could make you turn into Bahamut to do a big attack?" "That's the Limit Break already." "OOh, right. Okay, yeah, I got nothin'."

There was nothing to add. Old SMN was a Frankenstein of disparate and relatively incompatible things that somehow, against all odds, worked, but barely. Any tinkering with it would cause the whole house of cards to fall, and there was no meaningful room for growth or meaningful development for Old SMN. The irony here is that New SMN both has easy paths of growth to implement and logical within its own system:

Next expansion - add 3 more Primals after Phoenix, Leviathan, Ramuh, and Shiva. This is so easy of a choice it practically writes itself. I even pitched once before an idea for what all three would do I made up on the spot that were distinct from both each other and the three existing ones. It's that easy.

After that - add a 3rd Demi, probably Alexander. Could add in 3 more Primals at this point, but don't have to. If they do, Moogle Mog, Ravana, and Bismark would be my choices. "What about Odin or the Waring Triad?!"

...after THAT, Odin and the Warring Triad. Odin for the Demi would be pretty boss, be like FF13 with a mounted Odin fighting beside you. They could even do a fun little quirk and have him have your name as his subtitle (nodding to the whole killing blow thing from the FATE) and the Triad could be the three Primals for this set. OR, could do a "Sisters" thing and have the Triad be the Demi itself, but I'm not sure how that'd work.

After THAT, obviously the Four Lords. Genbu could work like FFTactics Golem using an AOE party stoneshield in place of Phoenix's Enkindle or Everlasting flight, then you go through the trio of Primals after that.

And at this point, we're talking 12.0, and I've only gone up through SB.

There are PLENTY of options for growth, is the point. The only trick is making them feel different enough from each other, but that's a problem every Job is going to face 4 expansions from now, if not earlier (if not ALREADY). New SMN is actually set up for growth since the system is modular. Expansions can take turns adding a new Primal trio, new Demi, or even both. The core rotation is hyper plug-and-play modular, which makes New SMN possibly the best set up Job in the game for future growth and additions at the moment.

Think about it, what are you going to add to GNB next expansion? A 4th powder gauge and another 2 gauge spender? What are you going to add to RDM, an upgraded visual for your base spells of Jolt 3 and Verfire/aero 3, and a yet another press of the Jolt button at the end of your combo after Resolution? What are you going to add to NIN? WHM? MCH?

There's not really a logical path of expansion for a lot of Jobs in 7.0 right now, which has me thinking 7.0 or 8.0, at some point there's going to be a huge shakeup because there's not a lot of room for a lot of Jobs to keep growing. New SMN, on the other hand, had a modular system that was very likely set up to make expansion easy.

Far from "reeks of being a rush job", it appears to be thoughtfully designed specifically to prevent it being painted into a corner again.

4) "Play like a level cap job then"; that's pretty subjective. Why should a level capped 90 Job NOT play like a level capped 50 Job? What even IS that? That's a horrifically nebulous, undefined term. What makes a "level capped job"? Is it number of abilities? APM? How is that DEFINED? Why is a level 50 ARR endgame rotation now insufficient for the game when it was fine at the time? Many of the same people are playing the game now as did then and enjoyed it then. If a Job plays equivalent to an ARR level 50 Job (or more), it's fine.

5) You may make such an argument - but such an argument is your opinion/subjective, not an objective statement of fact. There are arguments that there should be at least one Job of each role that is super accessible with low depth (again, New SMN has depth above zero) and that such a thing is good for an MMO. WoW Hunters and Paladins were a meme for years, but it were also the most played classes and probably responsible for a lot of "non-gamer friends" joining the community and growing it over time (since people tend to play longer if they have friends to play with, and people sometimes intimidated by complex classes getting their feet wet with simpler ones stick with the game longer, sometimes swapping to a more complex one later and sometimes sticking with the simple ones). One could also make an argument that having such Jobs in the game is actually good for it - provided that it's at least one per role but not ALL Jobs in a given role. At present, this metric is met by WAR (arguably PLD), WHM, and SMN. And there's an equally valid argument to your own that this is a good thing.

6) "I don’t care if there’s a dissenting view as long as it has logically understandable and coherent arguments." - Good, because mine have been.

6b) "popularity" in the sense of "widely played and used" is absolutely an argument for a Job having a place and being fine. It's NOT an argument for depth or complexity - as you say, people often want to play what is easy - but that's also kind of a point against your position that Jobs should be hard. If players actively avoid hard and complex Jobs, that means people don't WANT them. Or, rather, that the majority doesn't want them. THIS DOES NOT MEAN that hard/complex Jobs shouldn't exist. But it is absolutely an argument for Jobs like New SMN to be in the game.

7) They aren't "playing things badly". They're playing it well. The Job is designed to be easy to pick up and be played well. Your argument is that people should be forced to play things COMPLEXLY, and that's a different argument AND a subjective one that there are lots of arguments against. A one word argument against it might be "Wildstar"...though there's a lot of nuance there. Another would be "BLM".

Again: You want SMN to be complex because that's what you prefer. That doesn't make New SMN a bad Job. It makes it a Job you don't enjoy.

But more than that, wanting all Jobs to have a higher level of complexity may not be good for the game, and has a certain wiff of gatekeeping to it. Some Jobs being that way is fine - no one's arguing for BLM to be removed from the game, for example - but it doesn't mean a Job not being so is bad or broken or not fine.

Here's the way you should say it:

"New SMN is fine. I (meaning you) don't enjoy New SMN, though, and wish New SMN was more complex."

That's a valid position for you to hold. I won't fault you for holding it. I only am contesting the points you're wrong about. Specifically, when you state your subjective opinion as objective and agreed upon (or that everyone should agree upon) fact.

It should go without saying that this discussion about what defines a job as 'deep' or 'has depth' is most likely going to be wholly subjective as noone is going to agree 100% with what criteria should be used to give a job their measure of 'depth', which is why you cannot take one person's word on their view on how a job is.

This is also a really important point, and one I'm making, too: People are presenting their subjective opinion as an objective fact that everyone (more or less) agrees with or should agree with.

The problem is, subjective opinions are not facts. They are not universally accepted. Not everyone feels the same way.

Feel IS important - fun is entirely subjective - but it's not going to be the same to everyone. Some people ONLY have fun on BLM. Others ONLY have fun on SMN. Some few have fun on both. So while discussing what one finds fun is valid and important, it's also important to remember that one man's fun may be another's misery, which is why I'm a huge fan of the idea of Job diversity within roles. That way everyone can find one they enjoy playing in a given role.

I wouldn't say that AST is more involved rotations than the current summoner. You may be thinking of the opener, but after that? No, not at all. With tanks, maybe you could make a case that they're comparable.

It probably would defend on how one defines rotation in that sense. AST is an odd choice, but depends largely on if you count Arcana use (super high APM in burst phases before even considering target swapping) or their actual GCD rotation (which is literally only two buttons, one pressed only once every 30 seconds). AST's complexity derives from the oGCD juggling, not the GCD rotation, which...isn't really comparable to any other Job, come to think of it.

WHM is a better reference point because its standard rotation is more well defined and consistent, Dia every 30 sec, 3x Solace/Rapture per minute (GCDs so part of the rotation), 1x Misery per minute (ideally in burst windows), Presence of Mind and Assize as oGCDs used on CD, and Glare filler. (That's 7 routine use buttons, btw, not including things like Divine Benison, Tetragrammaton, or Aquaveil which are all short CDs and frequently weaved into the rotation)

And while one might consider WHM to also be comparable, it's still a bit simpler than SMN, as befits it having a Healing side-game to work into its DPS rotation kadence.

In terms of number of buttons, SMN routinely uses (in a 1 min cycle, single target fight) a comparable amount to WAR. WAR uses 10, I believe (1-2-3, -4, Upheaval, Infuriate, Inner Release, Onslaught, Primal Rend, Fell Cleave), Fell Cleave pulls some double duty (like Gemshine) but is still only one button. So again, SMN is more complex than the "simple" Job of the Tank role, which is again fitting since WAR has those tanking duties to attend to (even if they're much reduced from past expansions), in raw number of buttons, anyway. In terms of interactions, they're still pretty comparable, since SMN's kit is all about interactions as Gemshine and Astral Flow effects are tied to what you're doing on the Primal side of the house.

Depending on how one sees pulling resources or moving around parts of the rotation, WAR, WHM, and SMN are comparable in general use complexity, which is fine for the "baby Tank/Healer/DPS" Jobs of the game.

Nah I hate it for what it is too. When RDM/RPR run absolute circles around you in nuance and flexibility, and tanks+ast have more involved rotations, maybe the DPS job in question is poorly designed. What it took away is what makes me upset in addition to hating the job.

And why EXACTLY is this bad?

Suppose, for the sake of argument, Old SMN was still in the game and they had added some new Job to the game - let's call it "Caller" or "Evoker" (let's go with Evoker because it doesn't sound as lame). EVK was added with exactly the rotation, visual effects, etc that New SMN has, maybe with a few name changes, maybe not, doesn't matter.

You'd still have Old SMN in the game with some random new thing tacked on somewhere to the kit. We can even pretend that it works well and didn't cause the whole thing to collapse in on itself.

What SPECIFICALLY would then be your problem with Evoker being in the game?

.

Anyway, I'm with Connoor and Mikey, and am just saying New SMN is fine as a Job in the game, objectively (insomuch as it is functional). It's not perfect (nothing is), and it's not complex or supremely deep (few things are), but that doesn't mean it's not a good Job and lots of people are having fun with it, which justifies it having a place in the game as it is.

[tearagion]

In terms of number of buttons, SMN routinely uses (in a 1 min cycle, single target fight) a comparable amount to WAR. WAR uses 10, I believe (1-2-3, -4, Upheaval, Infuriate, Inner Release, Onslaught, Primal Rend, Fell Cleave), Fell Cleave pulls some double duty (like Gemshine) but is still only one button. So again, SMN is more complex than the "simple" Job of the Tank role, which is again fitting since WAR has those tanking duties to attend to (even if they're much reduced from past expansions), in raw number of buttons, anyway. In terms of interactions, they're still pretty comparable, since SMN's kit is all about interactions as Gemshine and Astral Flow effects are tied to what you're doing on the Primal side of the house.

WAR has to be in melee range for every GCD except Fell Cleave to do its peak damage, SMN has to be in melee for 1 GCD and has to cast for 3-4 GCDs. Slipstream saturation I would equate to deciding whether it's worth it to use an Onslaught outside of buffs. WAR also has a self-buff to maintain. Other than these factors they both press the buttons that light up, and the other ones on CD. Ergo, WAR is more involved than SMN even before you start to add defensive CDs and tank responsibilities.

Suppose, for the sake of argument, Old SMN was still in the game and they had added some new Job to the game - let's call it "Caller" or "Evoker" (let's go with Evoker because it doesn't sound as lame). EVK was added with exactly the rotation, visual effects, etc that New SMN has, maybe with a few name changes, maybe not, doesn't matter.

You'd still have Old SMN in the game with some random new thing tacked on somewhere to the kit. We can even pretend that it works well and didn't cause the whole thing to collapse in on itself.

What SPECIFICALLY would then be your problem with Evoker being in the game? That "bad players" or something would be able to competently play content?

I would still hate it, because I think it's a half-assed, shit design. Don't really need your false assumptions as to any other reasons why I might not like it.

objectively

lol

[Mikey_R]

I would still hate it, because I think it's a half-assed, shit design. Don't really need your false assumptions as to any other reasons why I might not like it.

That doesn't answer the question of WHY you hate it though. What about it makes it bad design? What about it makes it half assed?

Also, the never made an assumption on your position, mearly asked a question as to whether the statement they made was true or not.

[Mikey_R]

SAM hardcasts more often,

The only thing I want to comment on is this, Whilst SAM has more GCDs with cast times, Summoner does stand still and cast for a longer period of time overall. If SAM has 5 GCDs of casting per minute, that is 6.5 seconds of casting in total. Now, take Summoner, 2 Ruby Rites and a Ruin 3 is already at 7.1 seconds with an extra 3 seconds if you do not swiftcast Slipstream. So really, which one do you put more weight on? Total GCDs that need to cast, or the total cast time.

Paradox doesn't "just replaces a Fire/Ice when you swap elements" because BLM is not using Blizzard I to begin with, before level 90 ...

The thing is though, that was the argument of the poster who originally said it as they were just using button count and not how the buttons interact with the job. Going back to Summoner and Elemental Mastery, yes, it is just 1 button, however, it changes for different summons, an oGCD, a long cast ground DoT and then a 2 GCD melee strike with a gap closer. Baring Titan's oGCDs, the others need to have some thought put into where you use them. Do you swift cast the Slipstream or do you think you will need it for Ifrit, is the boss going to stand still long enough to get all the DoT ticks in, can I safely dash in or do I need to delay it. There are considerations in place that will affect your rotation if you just look at more than surface level.

Note, I am not arguing that Summoner is not a simple job, it is, however, just scratch away at the surface and you can see where the thought lies.

Now, separate from the quoted post, however Monk is an example of a job that takes the 'buttons to do a rotation' to the extreme, getting it's full fleet of GCD actions by level 60 (Six Sided Star really isn't used), the only things it gets are Riddle of Fire, Brotherhood and Riddle of Wind by level 72.

[Nizzi]

The thing is though, that was the argument of the poster who originally said it as they were just using button count and not how the buttons interact with the job. Going back to Summoner and Elemental Mastery, yes, it is just 1 button, however, it changes for different summons, an oGCD, a long cast ground DoT and then a 2 GCD melee strike with a gap closer. Baring Titan's oGCDs, the others need to have some thought put into where you use them. Do you swift cast the Slipstream or do you think you will need it for Ifrit, is the boss going to stand still long enough to get all the DoT ticks in, can I safely dash in or do I need to delay it. There are considerations in place that will affect your rotation if you just look at more than surface level.

Note, I am not arguing that Summoner is not a simple job, it is, however, just scratch away at the surface and you can see where the thought lies.

I've heard this from people who like the new Summoner all expac. It's just not true. What you've listed are just things that define the caster role; positioning and cast times. The difference being here that Red Mage and Black Mage have to actively adjust their rotations and what they're doing on a per GCD basis; Summoner gets its on-rails rotation reset every 60s and if you have to drop your Ifrit dash for a Ruin III, the potency lost is so minor in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't matter. There's no fail state for messing up Summoner, you're rewarded for existing by having virtually limitless free movement and damage where RDM and BLM have to work for uptime and movement, especially in this tier.

Once my static cleared P7S back in September I eventually opted to just do reclears on Summoner over Black Mage simply because Summoner is competitive and puts no work in versus the amount of struggling RDM and BLM have to do, especially with mechanics like Purgation that require you to pool all of your resources to keep full uptime and drain you dry only to dump you into Harvests immediately after. Boss hitboxes are so huge this expac that you don't have to think about "is the boss going to stand still long enough to get all the ticks in" (I would use Slipstream on Jumps 1 in P8S and Hephaistos' hitbox is so dummy thicc that he'd be in Slipstream still when he moved back to the center) and 3/5 bosses this tier literally do not move (P6S, P7S, P8Sp2). What you're saying doesn't reflect the game at the point it's in right now, and that's the problem.

Summoner is a cancer for balance within the caster role. It cannot continue to exist in this state while doing more damage than RDM, having nearly similar utility, having better movement and having no fail state beyond dying which is the fail state for every job in the game; your entire fight timeline is not messed up in the way that it is for RDM and BLM because it resets every 60s. Either make Summoner a physical ranged job and balance it according to the ranged DPS, make it an actual caster again, or make it worse than RDM because it has no reason to be doing similar or better numbers than a job that has no personal mitigation and is working much harder to do comparable damage. This tier especially has shown that the ability to raise is not as useful as it once was, meaning RDM has no genuine advantages over Summoner, especially not to justify it doing worse damage.

I don't even hate the concept and what they were going for on Summoner, and I think Astral Flow could potentially be one of the better job mechanics they've ever come up with. I just sincerely hate the execution and how it has destroyed the entire caster role for this expac.

[Chasingstars]

Your entire fight timeline is not messed up in the way that it [SMN] is for RDM and BLM because it resets every 60s.

I assume you are aware its not actually flat since you also play summoner. But just merely as a teaching tool for others who are less familiar:

Aethercharge/Bahamut/Phoenix are not acutally flat cooldowns. They are in fact affected by how much spellspeed a summoner has. It starts at 60 seconds, but it can be lowered.

With my current 2398 spellspeed, from a max speed blades acumen and food and materia and non-savage/extreme speedgear, my summon bahamut/phoenix is on a 51.84 cooldown. Ruin is on a 1.29/2.16 for cast/recast. Summon Gem is 2.16.

For older content at their max level by hitting the speed cap values are:

In ARR (50): ruin is 1.25/2.09, summon gem is 2.09 recast, aethercharge is 50.16
In HW (60): ruin is 1.24/2.07, summon gem is 2.07 recast, dreadwyrm trance is 49.86
In SB (70): ruin is 1.25/2.09, summon gem is 2.09 recast, summon demi is 50.28
For SHB (80), as I don't believe I hit the speedcap, its: 1.27/2.11, summon gem is 2.11 recast, summon demi is 50.82

These parts of the job is seperate from the rest of it which is flat cooldowns like radiant aegis (60s) or searing light (120s).

To have it be the equivalent of a flat 60 for bahamut, you must have 0 spellspeed investment. Which means Ruin is 1.5/2.5 and Astral Impulse & Fountain of Fire for example are also 2.5 for their gcd.

To achieve a 2.45 for AI & FoF, it should be somewhere around a 220 spellspeed investment, which means Bahamut/Phoenix has a 58.98 second cooldown. To have about a 1.45 second cooldown for ruin 3 with a now 2.43 recast time, that is around a 396 spellspeed investment, and Bahamut/Phoenix is 58.38.

Like using the 58.38 timer in content that takes 10 mins, the summoner by the end will have about an approximate 15 second lead compared to the rest of their party. This lead number becomes greater when the summon/aethercharge has a lower cooldown.

Like if I am in stormblood content, with 50.28 cooldown, I have about a 9.5s lead that can compound over just a 6 minute fight into a 57 second lead, meaning I am already into my 8th Demi-Bahamut while a person at 0 speed is just about to get into their 6th Demi-Bahamut.

[Renathras]

...

1) Honestly, Old SMN felt as much like a Ranged as a Caster to me then. I generally played RDM in ShB when I was doing DPS, but I also dabbled in SMN a lot because I liked the class fantasy and was also trying to play it better since I was debating which Jobs to main more in EW - my mistaken assumption at the time I'd only level one Tank, one Healer, and one DPSer, and how SCH/SMN would be efficient for that (that didn't pan out at all, mind you, but it was a consideration and I DID level SCH/SMN first in the end...), and I felt it was FAR more mobile and flexible than RDM was because of how Dualcast requires a full length cast while Old SMN could shift around Egi-Assault uses (because of the 2 charge system) a lot to always have a movement option when needed. And the few times I tried doing anything on BLM, it felt like an anchor tied to my feet. So Old SMN already had this feel to me. You had to think about where to use/save your instants (though New SMN reverses this with having to think about where NOT to use Ifrit), but it was already the most mobile and felt NEARLY as mobile as a Ranged if you were planning encounters well anyway. So I suppose New SMN just feels like an evolution of that to me.

As far as the lore: The "true" Summoners of Alleg worked by summoning actual Primals and then binding them. Huge story example of this was Bahamut. Granted, with a lot of extra cruelty to cherry the top of that warcrime sunday (that whole "keep the dragon denizens in a state of semi-suspended animation of pain and misery for thousands of years so their fervent desire for escape would keep fueling their prayers of Bahamut summoning to rescue them" thing). And you do use Egis with the exception of Bahamut and Phoenix - which I assume you had no lore problem with as that would have also had you dislike Old SMN? - you don't get the Primal version of the 3 until level 90. Which would have ACTUALLY been a good case of "Let's lock these to a level 90 JOB QUEST once you take the ship to Ultima Thul, as at that point in the story, we know what Primal summoning is, how it's a perversion of Creation Magic. They could have had a quest for SMNs there where you kinda-sorta reach an agreement with the three that you defeated first in your adventure, have a heart to heart, they realize that their people are under no danger now that the Beast Tribes and City-States have reached peace agreements, and agree to help you fight going forward since you're defending the Star and thus their people. "kinder, gentler" summoning rather than the brutish warcrime version the Allegans engaged in. And being summoned just from your personal stores of Aether instead of boxes of Crystals would limit their presence to just popping up to deliver an attack and empower you for a short time rather than their persistent forms the Beast Tribes used.

A lot of Jobs could benefit from a level 90 Job quest, but SMN most of all, I think...

2) Having played all three, Old SMN definitely felt higher than BLM, though I could see people arguing for either based on how good they are with priority systems and DoT management vs strict rotations. BLM's rotation was a bit stricter, I think? But that made Old SMN's feel smoother and more adaptable. Which is also what made Old SMN feel much more mobile.

But even comparing it with BLM, widely considered in the tier of "hardest Jobs in the game", should indicate that Old SMN was hard. If we think of Jobs as easy, medium, and hard, Old SMN easily fell into the "hard" category. The leveling process didn't help - remember how you had to get 2 Dreadwyrm Aether before summoning Bahamut and, at some point...you just don't anymore? From then on, the rotation is DWT into Bahamut? And then you had the "use all oGCDs in Bahamut" phase before they changed that to "use 8-9 (spell speed!) GCDs during Bahamut AND FBT? None of that was really intuitive. I'm not sure who thought "Oh yeah, that cross-class skill which isn't even technically part of my class/Job's own abilities and that mitigates boss damage (Virus) should be a oGCD weave during Bahamut regardless of what damage is going on in the raid since it will get me an extra Wyrmwave strike" logically after just reading the tooltips.

Those sorts of little things are what made Old SMN a hard Job, because it's stuff you really had no way of knowing unless you ran a parse and spent a LOT of time experimenting with target dummies OR read the work of people who did.

New SMN has room for optimization, it's just not much. Again, a kiddie pool may only have 6 inches of water in it, but that does not mean it has zero water in it. The irony is that SMN went from probably the hardest Caster to the easiest while RDM went from the easiest to intermediate. I'm still iffy on whether ShB RDM or EW RDM was harder, honestly. ShB Manafication required more thought, but EW RDM encourages triple burst in 2 min windows, so it's kind of more a side grade than getting significantly easier or harder. Though as literally nothing else changed in the rotation...side grade is kind of where I've come down on it. If you're good at lining stuff up with burst windows, it's easier, if you're not great at tracking burst windows, ShB RDM was easier and EW's is harder.

3) I think the main problem there was when Searing Light was a Carby skill...which is why they removed it from being a Carby skill. I think the optimal position is after the 3rd now (used to be 2nd when we opened with a Ruin 3 before Searing Light, but once that was removed from Carby, we can open directly into DWT)

3b) MCH and BRD don't have to stand still around 1/9th of their time to cast. It's not MUCH, but it's not ZERO. A common refrain I'm having to say over and over. Greater than zero is not zero. It may not be significantly greater than zero, but it IS greater than zero.

3c) As Mikey_R noted, SMN spends more time casting per minute than SAM does.

3cii) Which version are we talking about? The original or the OP? The reason Alleg banned Summoning was because the most powerful Summoners DID bind and use Primals, wasn't it? We also see a similar pattern on the Thirteenth with the Memoriates. In both cases, it was like the Dark Side of the Force in Star Wars that just inherently corrupts people. BUUUUT, as I noted above (thank you, SE, for NOT giving us level 90 Job Quests... /sarcasm), what we're using now is most likely a semi-perfected form of Creation Magic rather than Primal Summoning in the Beast Tribe sense. Also, my money on next Demi would probably be Alexander, but who can say?

3d) Doesn't change the fact they can do it, and it is openended. There are also a lot of ways to use two buttons. Just with the three we have, one has four sets of an instant cast 2.5 sec GCD and an oGCD weve, one has four instant cast 1.5 sec GCDs and a long cast GCD, and one has 2 long cast GCDs and two instant GCDs in a 1-2 combo, the 1 of which includes a gap closer. There are a LOT of ways to mix and match this up. One could have 3 1.5 sec CAST GCDs with a single weave, one could have 5 casts with a second skill that can be used as many times as you wish and does damage based on how many of the 5 have been cast, etc. There are a lot of possible things you can do with even just two buttons. Moreover, they could add more - right now, only the Demis use Enkindle, but that button could be repurposed in the future as yet another thing to do while a Primal is out. Not taking additional hotbar spaces isn't the same as not being an extra ability. Verholy/flare don't take up additional hotbar spaces (as of 5.0), but they CLEARLY are not Veraero/thunder. Likewise, Paradox is clearly not Fire 1/Blizzard 1, despite adding no new hotbar space.

The point here is that the system being modular allows for extensive growth and has effectively made the Job futureproofed at least for a half-dozen expansions. You may personally not find it meaningful - though I would say you aren't thinking of how different they can be... - but in terms of "Is it designed into a corner or can they add new things in future expansions", New SMN can very clearly add new things, and because of the systems it has established, it can do so basically infinitely since it isn't restricted by hotbar slots like other Jobs would be.

The big reason this works is because the Primals AREN'T just "reskins". They actually DO change your rotation. Imagine if on RDM when you hit Manification, for the next 30 seconds all your weaponstrikes were Enchanted. Now you just go ham as a Melee. Or maybe make it a toggle so you can swap between being a "Melee" and being a Caster. Would you say "Nah, that's just a reskin"? It would actually change up your rotation - the order of buttons you press and the feel of the combat since they have things like different GCDs (sword attacks are less than 2.5 sec GCDs when Enchanted). SMN's Primals work this way, too. IF using a Primal just gave you the same thing - like if all of them had the 4x GCD/oGCD that Titan did, just with Earth, Wind, and Fire visual effects being the only difference? If that was the case, you would be 100% right.

But they don't. Those two buttons now feel completely different to press and the order you use them (the "rotation" of the buttons) changes.

Like I pointed out: Ask yourself this same question for other Jobs. What will PLD get in 7.0? Another sword attack at the end of its Requiescat combo? What will RDM get? Another press of Jolt, or will it be another press of Holy/Flare to try and get a proc on the other element? (Granted, that actually WOULD be a somewhat meaningful change, but after that, they'd have to add stacks to Verfire/Stone before you could keep going with that process). What will MNK get that isn't just a straight upgrade to an existing ability? What will WAR get? A second charge on Primal Rend? A third charge on Infuriate? What will they add to MCH? Another tool? A second charge on Drill? A third charge on Reassemble? Another finisher on the end of Queen?

A lot of Jobs are in the "designed into a corner" that will require by 8.0 or 9.0 a lot of reworks, which is probably why they're going so heavy on the reworks now - and their hand was forced with PLD, since it really DOESN'T have a lot of room for growth. Someone here said (not sure if it as you or someone else) that New SMN seemed a rush Job they didn't think through, but it's very clearly thought out with a 120 min rotation fitting neatly into two 60 sec cycles. Like, the pieces interlock perfectly into a 60 sec chunk, and as I've pointed out, the future proofing is there for future growth potential. But look at New PLD. While you don't have to drop Atonements anymore (apparently, the optimal rotation is just "have a HS sometime during FoF/Requiescat, but it doesn't matter much what else goes there, so just keep your standard rotation going"), there's really nothing to ADD other than a new animation for Royal Authority or a third charge of Intervene. THAT was the rush job.

Now, it works, don't get me wrong, and once they buff the numbers, it'll be "fine", but unlike New SMN, it doesn't seem like they designed it for long-term future growth, more a thing they needed to get out the gate relatively quickly that would work in the moment.

And as far as what they'd add: For the Demis or the Primals?

If I had to guess what the Demis would be going forward, Alexander is the next one on my list. After that it could be several things, Shinryu would probably be up there, even if it might feel kinda weird (but hey, Zenos was our combatsexual lover, so summoning him wouldn't be THAT much more odd than summoning the Twins dead grandpa...?), though it could be Genbu and the 3 other Lords be the Primals for that segment. That's a little weirder to me because, though we fight them in Trials, they're not exactly "Primals" in the normal sense. Then again, IF WE ACTUALLY HAD JOB QUESTS AGAIN, it could be a matter of them making pacts with us and lending us their power, and some lore explanation of their Animasu being partly absorbed by us when we fought or whatever. And probably after that, Eden would be the logical choice for the next one, which could provide a lot of opportunities for Primal options given the Eden raid encounters.

So there really IS a lot of room there to grow, and each expansion adds new options.

3ciii) I'm kinda thinking you're right. Level squish for 9.0? Or maybe 10.0...

So, what Jobs are there that could survive that?

Well, right now, New SMN. Post level squish/ability squish, SMN could have the exact skills it has right now and work - as you lot are fond of saying, it already plays like a level 70 Job...

4) A level 90 Job playing like a level 50 Job did WHEN LEVEL 50 WAS THE LEVEL CAP isn't a problem, imo. Given the amount of abilities that have been pruned and such over time, the Jobs at level 50 now don't have as many abilities as they had at level 50 in 2.5. But a Job doesn't need a half dozen new buttons every expansion. At level 50, we had around 20-something abilities for the typical Job (probably 25-30 when Cross-Class is accounted for), and 25-30 is a goodly number of buttons to press. Some Jobs having more is fine (*cough*AST*cough*), but not every one needs that, no.

____a) Is subjective, not everyone gets bored at the same place or with the same things.
____b) Right, which is why I'd say "when level 50 was the level cap", which ROUGHLY equals most Jobs at level 70 today. Like SMN and RDM.
____c) lol, fair enough.

5) Honestly? I have no real preference. My argument is not - and never has been - that Old SMN should have been removed from the game. I always felt the "Green Caller" was a weird fit and not really a Summoner. New SMN feels a hell of a lot more like a Summoner than Old SMN did. Old SMN didn't even get its first true Summon until Bahamut in SB. My contention has always been that they should have taken the Green Mage bits and actually created a new Caster GRM and ported that playstyle to it. But that's a different argument.

My contention isn't that Old SMN should have been removed, and never has been. I've been absolutely explicit on this point.

My contention is that New SMN is fine as a Job in the game.

It's why I even posed the hypothetical of if New SMN was added as the new Caster Job (say "Evoker" or something) and Old SMN had been left in the game, I would ALSO be saying Evoker is fine as a Job in the game today. That is, in vacuum, New SMN is not a bad Job. It's not broken, braindead, needs fixing, etc. It's fine. It's definitely not Old SMN, and had it not replaced Old SMN, people might be able to look at it more objectively and see that, too.

I don't think ALL of the hate is from that (you have people like Tearagion there), but I do think the abject inability of the community to look at New SMN objectively IS because it replaced/deleted Old SMN. If Old SMN was still in the game, you'd get people like the Healer forum badmouthing it and elitists that don't want casual people do to hard content badmouthing it, but I think far more people would be able to look at it objectively and see that it's a well put together Job and works well as it is, with good room for future additions to be made to keep it fresh.

As for RDM - it's actually ironic to me that they made RDM arguably harder (though that's just the 2 min meta curse striking again, I think) at the same time they vastly simplified SMN...

I don't think every Job needs a high skill ceiling. I think it's fine a few don't. I think it's a problem when THEY ALL don't, but I don't think some few being that way is bad. As I said before, WoW Hunters and Paladins were accused of being easy with low skill ceilings for years (and may still be, I dunno), but it was good for the game that they existed and led to a lot of growth and friends picking up the game that might not have otherwise. That's a good thing for an MMO, not a bad thing.

6) This section has intentionally been left blank.

6b) It's possible, but that isn't what New SMN is. Moreover, when we look at most played, we aren't only looking at raiders. I think there WOULD be a point where a Job would be too braindead for normal people to enjoy it. Like I enjoy playing Healers (except AST), but that's because I have buttons other than Glare to hit and the role's focus (in theory) is on health bars. I don't think a true one-button DPS Job would, in fact, be all that popular. I think there is a critical point where the direction of that curve shifts.

7) Well, in that case it doesn't matter, and those people aren't clearing high end content anyway. A New SMN only casting Ruin III for entire fights is going to do no better than a RDM casting only Jolt II for entire fights. In fact, they have the exact same potency and overall GCD use, so they'd output identical performances doing so.

On a side note: I just like thinking about things and discussing things with people. Helps that I'm a fast typist. My first Titania and SoS Extreme clears were in PFs with no voice chat and I ended up knowing the fights so well (from so many failed groups) that I determined to get the clears and was actively raid-calling in /party. Granted, there were plenty of typoes, but I called all the major mechanics between casts in text and everyone said when we got the clear it helped so much. /shrug

I've heard this from people who like the new Summoner all expac. It's just not true. What you've listed are just things that define the caster role; positioning and cast times. The difference being here that Red Mage and Black Mage have to actively adjust their rotations and what they're doing on a per GCD basis;

I think this is part of the disconnect. You guys who don't like New SMN keep coming back to this point. That RDM and BLM have to decide basically skill to skill which button to use based on the situation. IN PRACTICE, that's WAY overselling RDM and completely misrepresenting BLM. BLM works like SMN in that it needs to know the future of the fight to determine when to use skills. A BLM that is just seeing a boss cast bar for a mechanic and JUST THEN making the decision on what ability to use is doing BLM wrong. And RDM, in practice, is only deciding when to delay a melee phase and when to use Acceleration. While that's WAY more variable, it does require you to stock a resource it would have been more optimal use. And say you use Acceleration for max burst so you don't have it for movement? You have Enchanted Reprise or Swiftcast for that - you are the only Reser in the game that doesn't need to save Swiftcasts for Raising.

SMN does this same thing, but more like BLM does, in that it needs to be looking forward at the whole fight and fitting its abilities around mechanics in 15 second chunks. If you drop your Ifrit Dash, you're dropping 580 potency for 310. That's a pretty substantial hit. RDM using Swiftcast on a Verthunder/Aero......can actually be a DPS gain. Dropping a Fire/Stone for a Jolt II is a mere 20 potency loss. Enchanted Reprise is a bit more complicated since it takes 5/5 Mana from you to use, but itself does the same potency as Fire/Stone, which is actually higher than Jolt. But given that Mana translates to damage, it's still a DPS loss, but is it a 270 point DPS loss like using Ruin III instead of Crimson Cyclone/Strike? I'd water it comes out being pretty close to comparable.

The "fail state" for messing up on SMN is comparable to the "fail state" for messing up that same way on RDM.

Once my static cleared P7S back in September I eventually opted to just do reclears on Summoner over Black Mage simply because Summoner is competitive and puts no work in versus the amount of struggling RDM and BLM have to do,

This is always such a weird argument to me. "I hate a thing so much, it's the thing I decided to use because it was more enjoyable than doing it on the things I claim this thing should be more like". And yes, I did say "more enjoyable"; if the others were genuinely more enjoyable, you'd play them instead. The "struggling" is what you're arguing Jobs should have, so if you were actively avoiding it, it indicates that said "struggling" is, in fact, a negative, not a positive. A thing even you were avoiding when given the choice.

And that's the big reason that argument is so weird to me:

It claims people will only do the "better" thing if FORCED INTO IT, and if given a choice, will do the "worse" thing...but the obvious implication is that people actually want the "worse" thing...which implies it's actually the better thing.

Yeah yeah, boredom, not wanting to make things harder on your party, etc etc - you can make such arguments, but the fact is that WHEN GIVEN THE CHOICE, you chose to use SMN instead of RDM or BLM.

I'm really big about giving players CHOICES, meaning if they are only picking RDM/BLM if they are forced to do so, that makes me think RDM/BLM are bad Jobs that need to be fixed, not that SMN, the Job people are actively picking instead, is the one that's damaged.

Summoner is a cancer for balance within the caster role.

SMN isn't a "cancer", the issue right now is that RDM needs a serious power boost. (And as I noted above, the "fail state" for SMN is comparable to the "fail state" for RDM, and that shouldn't really even be relevant ANYWAY, but insomuch as it is, the two are comparable.) For some reason, the Devs think Vercure is hyper-utility and don't want to give RDM more damage, but imo it should be balanced to do comparable damage to SMN since they're in a similar utility and difficulty ballpark; RDM is a bit harder but offers the better Raise utility, SMN is a bit easier but its Raise utility is weaker, thus the two being balanced to do similar damage makes sense.

Either make Summoner a physical ranged job

L...O...L...? o.O

because it has no reason to be doing similar or better numbers than a job that has no personal mitigation and is working much harder to do comparable damage.

"much harder"? o.O

I play RDM and SMN. RDM is a bit harder, but "much harder"? What?

Also, RDM has better Raise utility than SMN - SMN can use one Swiftcast Raise per minute, which makes it less mobile during Garuda/Ifrit (and probably have to drop one of the casts from one of those to make up the GCD) while Verraise can be used several in a row between Jolt casts, a DPS loss but not nearly as much of one as SMN having to hardcast a second Raise would be - and RDM has a partywide damage reduction/mitigation which SMN does not have - Carby shields are single target only, and ONLY for you - not to mention RDM can always swap a Jolt/Fire/Stone (at a DPS loss, yes, but it's THERE) for a Vercure if it needs a little more health to survive a mechanic where SMN can use a Carby shield, but if that's not enough, then what? LolPhysic?

Both have party buffs, SMN's Searing Light +3% damage for 30 sec and RDM's Embolden +5% for 20 seconds - which PROBABLY maths out to a greater party damage increase because that's +5% combined with other party buffs while SMN's is only +3% under the 15-20 sec buff window boost and then drops down to the flat 3% once the other buffs wear off. But for the sake of argument, these are PROBABLY equivalent.

So their party utility is that they have a similar DPS boost to the party, RDM has an additional party mitigation that SMN does not and a personal OR party heal it can use at a DPS loss, SMN has some additional party healing locked to once per 2 minutes if damage happens to fall under Everlasting Flight (which can't be moved around significantly) and a personal mitigation that can't be stacked or shared with the party, and RDM has semi-infinite Raise potential at a GCD's loss of potency/mana while SMN has a single cast of it (which requires Swiftcast) for a single GCD's worth of lost potency with any further Raising during that 60 seconds requiring sacrificing at least 3 GCDs.

Sounds like them doing a similar amount of damage would make perfect sense - SMN is a bit easier but RDM has a bit more utility in exchange for the SLIGHTLY harder rotation.

This tier especially has shown that the ability to raise is not as useful as it once was, meaning RDM has no genuine advantages over Summoner, especially not to justify it doing worse damage.

"not as useful as it once was" != not useful. It depends on when it happens in the fight.

THAT SAID: I agree that RDM should not be doing WORSE damage than SMN, and needs to be buffed anyway. There's no reason RDM should be doing DANCER levels of DPS. That's just beyond stupid, and that argument exists regardless of SMN even being in the conversation right now.

I don't even hate the concept and what they were going for on Summoner, and I think Astral Flow could potentially be one of the better job mechanics they've ever come up with. I just sincerely hate the execution and how it has destroyed the entire caster role for this expac.

Nizzi.......New SMN isn't what "has destroyed the entire caster role for this expac."

My list, off the top of my head:

1) Even BLM is doing less damage than most Melees instead of tied at 1st with SAM like ShB.

2) RDM is doing comparable damage to DANCER, the Ranged role, which is just stupid.

3) Boss hitboxes the size of planets making Melees basically Ranged that do more damage.

4) 2 min meta that screws with the damage rotation profiles of all the Casters (all the Jobs in the game, but Casters seem to be particularly affected).

5) The movement and particularly TIMING of movement and resource needs during fights - as you noted with P7S Purgation/Harvests.

Those things all have a much greater issue with Caster balance. Imagine for a moment if Old SMN still existed but all those above things were happening. Old SMN would be out-DPSing BLM (probably, it was way more mobile and flexible), but still doing less damage than most of the Melees, and all those issues listed above would still exist. RDM would still be doing DANCER levels of damage and RDM and BLM (and ALSO SMN) would not be far more difficult than the reward in performance/output you're getting for playing them.

That says to me the issue is not New SMN, it's all that OTHER stuff.

Honestly pal it just gets lost in the sea of words.

True, but there's a lot to comment on in these threads.

Warrior (and arguably dark knight) has its rotation settling down at level 70, which is less than ideal - although seeing as they're tanks it's not the end of the world. At this point, warrior has beast gauge and infuriate counters to keep track of, as well as tank responsibilities and storm's eye upkeep such as it is. Likewise, dark knight has black blood, mp and darkside to track as well as their tank responsibilites.

And New SMN has Primals, Energy Drain, Aetherflow stacks, Ruin IV, Searing Light, and Trance CDs to keep track of. We can make simple things sound complex lining them up end to end, but in practice, Beast Gauge is "don't overcap", Infuriate is "don't overcap, burn during burst", Storm's Eye is Dia, and "Tank responsibilities" have mostly come down to "turn on Tank stance when the fight starts, when you get the big red box around you, press a CD". (Read the Tank forums and people like wielding that hyperbole pretty regularly there)

As for machinist and red mage I don't play them to an adequate level to answer - however I am aware that they are significantly more involved than level 90 summoner at this stage, with 2 gauges and higher apm on mch and casts and stuff on rdm.

Don't use the phrase "significantly more involved". "marginally" might fit for RDM. MCH's rotation is LARGELY a FCFS system of using Air Anchor/Drill/Chainsaw when up; use Reassemble on one if up, and making sure not to use Hypercharge if you're less than 8 sec from one of those three coming up. There's a bit of nuance, but MCH is pretty close to SMN in terms of rotational difficulty. It has a higher APM entirely because of Hypercharge, but this is just going 1-2-1-3-1-2-1-3-1-2/3 between Heat Blast and your two oGCDs of Gauss Round and Ricochet.

RDM's is a bit more involved because you want to do a little more setup. Its casts aren't complex - in fact, that's the LEAST complex of its systems - just operating as a pendulum and you remembering to only weave in the Dualcast spell windows, not clipping by trying to weave after the short cast. The real optimization comes from trying to pool resources for the burst phase to get the most melee/cast combos in as you can during those windows. The general rotation itself is super easy 1-2 1-3, where you press 1a or 1b if you get a proc. It's not nothing, but it's not exactly gigabrain if you can get the procs somewhere on your HUD that's noticeable. The burst itself is easy, as 50/50 is easy to remember and a quick glance can tell you whether you're using Holy or Flare. You also have Acceleration, Swiftcast, and in a pinch Enchanted Reprise to use for movement, and for movement that doesn't require a disengage, you can go into your melee combo. And if you can get your melee combo in before the movement WITH disengage, then your next 3 casts are freemovement Holy/Flare-Scorch-Resolution. It's always an "ahhh...this is nice..." moment on RDM when you have a movement phase just AFTER you complete your melee combo because it's a really simple series of button presses you don't even have to think about the next 7.5 sec, which is comparable to hitting Titan on SMN. Except with a lower APM and less button presses than SMN during Titan.

...and not to sound like a broken record, but I will again note that I strongly feel RDM does FAR too little damage and should get a hefty boost up to SMN level or NIN level or something like that.

I'm not sure if it's worth emphasising that the majority of jobs you suggested are dual responsibility, rather than dps.

It is. That'd be a valid point.

...if I was arguing for every DPS Job to be equivalent to SMN.

As noted, I said having ONE Job in each role at SMN's level is not a problem or bad thing.

SAM is also ideally in melee range for all but 1 GCD max of filler, and has actual job mechanics to contend with, but go off about how SMN casting three or four times is really impactful and requires lots of thinking past a single pull of any fight, if that. Really scraping the bottom of the barrel to pick out only that.

With boss hitboxes the size of planets, "ideally in melee range" at this point means "you haven't jumped off the platform/deathwalled". <_<