Summoner Issues & Player Feedback

[Boblawblah]

Odin would be big and flashy. Just saying..

[faiarrow]

I've mained summoner since I began in XIV before HW through the expacs all the way through even Endwalker before I hung up my grimoire to play Black Mage so I could feel something and honestly...

It's all style no substance now.

Our pet has been lobotomised to no longer attack - heck searing light doesn't deploy from it any more because people were too lazy to learn how to place their pets since they reset after every demi. The animations fantastic and are very fancy but you feel like you have very little impact outside of Bahamut burst phase with actual damage. We went from one of the highest DPS mage classes competing with BLM at a top level of play in SB and ShB if you took the time to actually learn how to play the job to 'chew gummies to win.'

DSR has a phase chart that is just coloured circles. For the entire fight. For your gummies and bursts in particular order for each phase. It's great it's accessible to people but it has become heinously boring to play for those who actually enjoyed some complexity in their job. Homogenization is a word thrown around a lot with the job updates ever since EW and it honestly is valid in criticism for Summoner.

Seeing Pictomancer get actual complexity in its combos from what we've seen so far in the PLL was a slap to the face honestly. I'm not asking for HW summoner to return - pet/egi swapping for contagion et al was fun if you could do it but definitely a hard entry bar for the role, and I know people meme about the SB opener being crazy for high end play with how big it was or the amount of weaving you had to do for Bahamut damage, but I feel ShB was the healthiest balance of complexity with easier entry into the role to learn it. You had impact in what you did with damage instead of being an awkward pseudo-support caster, DoTs to manage between burst phases, and something that actually kept you engaged while playing it.

It's hard to be optimistic about the Media Tour for the job because I suspect our issues with potencies and smack colour to win will continue after the job showcase video last night.

[Mondschnee]

I wouldn't say I had high hopes for summoner but I would at least have expected they consider implementing *some* of the user feedback given here on the forums. From what we've seen, it doesn't look like summoner will be an actual caster again, nor does it seem like the gameplay will become even remotely more flexible or interesting... Very disappointing, very boring.

[Thel_Eruyt]

Im actually fine with summoner not casting, well perhaps casting to "summon the primal" but once you are infused by its power I do not feel the need to cast, I was liking the direction they were taking in EW, It made me feel like a summoner not a D.o.t. mage . I admit that it was simple but visually was appealing but now having just a bahamut 2.0 fels lackin and it snot even the gameplay I am mad about but just, we have met like 20 other primals, but isntead of using oen of them we get the fanfic bahamut a pictomancer did.

And I do not get the "the previous bahamut was too allagan so this one is closer to the original" ive seen bahamuts dad and all of bahamuts siblings, (except ratatoskr, for obvious reasons) all of them had normal wings, not swords so I quite doubt thats "closer" to the original... and wasn't Tiamat the one that actually summoned bahamut before the allagans captured it?

[NovaBismarck]

I can see how figuring out the best way forward for summoner is tricky. I've seen all sorts of suggestions. I'm sure it was not an easy path. All in all, people are playing summoner now. So, that means there are plenty of people out there that like well enough. After the rocket science hoops that we jumped in the early game over the years, it did feel pretty dumbed down but I am glad they made summoner feel more like an actual summoner. It still has some really good aspects like the movement. I can see how people who wanted a more complicated class to dive into savage would be disappointed (I had a friend who was in that camp for sure).

The new primal. Looks like a bahamut reskin. My guess is they'll likely give us some good lore based reason that they chose that direction. I saw a handful of people who were excited for a new bahamut, but a lot of the comments from reddit were less favorable. (Thread can be found via google search ffxiv the future of summoner) However, just from being in the camp of primal collector hoping to summon some cool new thing, that one did not land for me from a visual standpoint. I am hoping the actual skills we get for summoner will make it more desirable.
(I honestly hate complaining, because I know people worked hard on it, but certainly someone at the top should have seen that a reskin was going to cause upset).
I will just bury my grief in new dye channel options and that pictomancer ability with the hammer.

[seolhyun]

all they had to do was make the new summon something different. ppl want to be a summoner not a bahamut mage.

[Vandso]

From all the things they could have done, they chose the worst one.

Of all the possible outcomes, they could've:

• Added Ramuh, Shiva and Leviathan during Phoenix phase. Even if it was just visuals, people would be way happier;
• Added Odin or Alexander as a 180s Egi-summon. Again, way cooler than another Bahamut;
• Added a fourth Egi-summon, even that would be fine (as long as it wasn't a remix of the already existing summons);
• Just reskined Bahamut. This would still suck, but it would suck less than having Bahamut to appear 3 times more than Phoenix in a fight;
• Didn't add any new summon, but made the Egi-summons physically attack their target like the Demi-summons, that way it would actually feel like a summoner;
• Added a new gauge that increases by 10 every time you use a lego, and when it gets 100 you can do the big aoe ability. This is way more interesting than simply having a follow up for the party buff, it doesn't even makes sense imo;
• Increased the Aetherflow gauge by 3 and making Energy Drain and Energy Siphon give 3 Aetherflows instead of 2. We need more buttons to press, not another tier for Fester;
• Gave us an ability like Energy Drain/Siphon that only gives 1 Aetherflow but has 30s cooldown. That's another alternative that is way more engaging than Fester 2.

Anyway, the more I think about how the new Summoner sucks, the more mad I get, and we know they won't change anything at this point. At least we now have confirmation that they don't listen or care about their playerbase, at least the western one. I'll just boycott Summoner for the next expansion and pretend I'm still worth something in this game.

[LittleArrow]

For the concern of lower level summons and having to figure out an egi form for them, there are already egi forms for Ramuh (they're used in his fight), and it's easy to just recolor current egi's or use current in-game models (like the water/ice sprites for Levi/Shiva). However, the easiest and most logical answer to this is, don't put those summons at lower level and keep the current rotation as it is - just add the higher level summons after 90 / 100. There's no need to include Shiva / Levi / Ramuh before the level they would be the full primal forms.

I don't want to go on and on about this, but it truly does seem the only way to enact change with the devs is to make the most noise. Seeing as how they still haven't fixed the limited races, they still haven't come up with a better rotation for healers, they still haven't addressed many more very valid gameplay criticisms after years of complaints, and on top of that they definitely don't seem to implement the complaints that are just passively given; it does kinda seem squeaky wheel gets the oil sort of situation.

[LittleArrow]

From all the things they could have done, they chose the worst one.

Of all the possible outcomes, they could've:

• Added Ramuh, Shiva and Leviathan during Phoenix phase. Even if it was just visuals, people would be way happier;
• Added Odin or Alexander as a 180s Egi-summon. Again, way cooler than another Bahamut;
• Added a fourth Egi-summon, even that would be fine (as long as it wasn't a remix of the already existing summons);
• Just reskined Bahamut. This would still suck, but it would suck less than having Bahamut to appear 3 times more than Phoenix in a fight;
• Didn't add any new summon, but made the Egi-summons physically attack their target like the Demi-summons, that way it would actually feel like a summoner;
• Added a new gauge that increases by 10 every time you use a lego, and when it gets 100 you can do the big aoe ability. This is way more interesting than simply having a follow up for the party buff, it doesn't even makes sense imo;
• Increased the Aetherflow gauge by 3 and making Energy Drain and Energy Siphon give 3 Aetherflows instead of 2. We need more buttons to press, not another tier for Fester;
• Gave us an ability like Energy Drain/Siphon that only gives 1 Aetherflow but has 30s cooldown. That's another alternative that is way more engaging than Fester 2.

Anyway, the more I think about how the new Summoner sucks, the more mad I get, and we know they won't change anything at this point. At least we now have confirmation that they don't listen or care about their playerbase, at least the western one. I'll just boycott Summoner for the next expansion and pretend I'm still worth something in this game.

I totally get the frustration, but don't give up! Summoner is still really fun. Of course, there are more complicated jobs out there, but they did change it for the better. It's not a weird dot mage, we have our classic basic summons. There might be a really cool story around Solar Bahamut. I'm 100% on your side, but if you enjoy the job, don't let criticisms / forums / whatever push you away from something that you enjoy. The job is still the same, they're just adding to it. It is a stomach punch to think we have to wait, but we're waiting with a job we already enjoy.

I say to try it out! Summoner is the single coolest job across all Final Fantasy franchises. It's such a cool job that even in the games they didn't have the job they still included the summons. I mean, come on, when you look up "best of.." or "all moves..." from a final fantasy game what do you find? Limit breaks and SUMMONS! Summoner is the most Final Fantasy job there is. It's not something you'll find in any other game. Warlock is a sad little worm of a job compared to pulling up Ifrit, Titan, and Garuda and watching them do their classic moves. Also, I don't care what they call him, Neo-Bahamut - actually it's really Bahamut Zero; Bahamut Zero is the coolest Bahamut there is!

Yes, SE really dropped the ball, but summoner is still fun and I think it's better than it has ever been for a Final Fantasy job in a Final Fantasy game!

I mean, look at this unit! It comes from space, spreads its wings to draw energy *cough*solarenergy*cough* and absolutely orbital blasts the enemy from space! I can honestly say, aside from the tanks, Summoner is the only job in the game where our base moves are 100% way cooler than our limit break! Solar Bahamut is going to be fun. SE still needs to add the other summons, but this was a super cool call back for a level 100 move.

[faiarrow]

There might be a really cool story around Solar Bahamut.

Given we used to actually get lore in the job quests, the things they stopped doing to give us the unified role quests to lessen the burden on the development cycle having to write quests for all the jobs, I doubt this. We have no lore for Phoenix and its trance beyond just '[finger guns] carteneau!' and Binding Coils if you do it since it's an optional raid series. Unless we get a sentence about it in the eventual 4th Encyclopaedia I highly doubt we're getting more beyond the casual PLL mention of 'this is more like what actual original bahamut was' and maybe a tiny bit of lore allusion in the tooltip.

The job is still the same, they're just adding to it. It is a stomach punch to think we have to wait, but we're waiting with a job we already enjoy. (...) Yes, SE really dropped the ball, but summoner is still fun and I think it's better than it has ever been for a Final Fantasy job in a Final Fantasy game!

I really wish I could have your level of optimism, and respectfully I do appreciate you're trying to make people see a light to what feels like the endless tunnel of gloom most long-term SMN players have had, however since the job has been unfun to play since 6.0 it's a bitter pill to swallow having to wait to see how further butchered it will be. Again, it LOOKS great, but we could have gotten so much better with an actual 2nd gem cycle between Bahamut and Phoenix with other summons, some risk-reward with how you cycle through particular gems for single/aoe buffs in burst phase, anything beyond the monotonous 1-2-3-Burst-1-2-3-Burst where 2/3 gems feel pitiful in damage.

"But the lore says we reached our aetherwell cap after Garuda thus can't imbue further summon essences" is the weakest excuse in a game that has, constantly, retconned major plot points before given its breaking this rule already with Solar Bahamut existing.