Summoner needs a fix or a new reason to play it.

[AvoSturmfaust]

Usually im not the one which opens such Threads in particular if there are many of them already but i talked with a good friend and realized something really important.

Summoner lost the meaning to actually play the Job, there is besides the "i like summoner" point no reason to play this Class anymore.

Ress - Yes Summoner has a Ress but in a Prog Sitatuation RDM has just way more value

Damage - Compared to ShB the current Summoner is completly lacking on Damage, i mean im generally not the Fan of the whole "Range, Ress Tax" Philosophy but we are at a Point where the Damage matters.

Movement - You could argument that Summoner has free movement, but lets be real for a Second here and judge the Situation and the different Casters,

RDM can Move after every second Skill

Picto has Smudge and the ability to move huge distances after every Cast (Yea People say Picto has the less mobility but the Recast/Cast Time allows some huge Distance between each Casts) and can easly use Swift since its not needed for a Ress

Blm has Swift, Triplecast, Xenoglossy, Paradox, Fire 3, Despair, Thunder and can with the recent Changes really good slidecasting, BLM changed from standing turret to walking turret


So what has Summoner left? Nothing, through the "Egis" even many of his Skills have Pet Potency which means less Potency then actually standing on the description

There is really no reason anymore to bring a Summoner in your Group and thats something which is insane sad to see, because ShB Summoner was such a huge Powerhouse.

So please Square maybe its really time to consider removing the "Ress Tax" or giving Summoner a new Identity because in his current state he lacks everything.

[Carighan]

Summoner can actually do their burst combo when it comes up? Unlike RDM, in current fights?

[Supersnow845]

Summoner can actually do their burst combo when it comes up? Unlike RDM, in current fights?

To be fair SMN’s overtly restrictive combo forcing Demi drift was a problem in FRU that made it uniquely terrible it’s just savage doesn’t have enough downtime so they both have their downsides there

[Rithy255]

I really don't want Current summoner to ever be "meta" as much as I think it should get some potency buffs, in endwalker primarily made red mage a pretty useless job despite actually having to worry about mobility.

I really hope summoner gets a good rework in 8.0 its current design while it may fit a "summoner" is just not fun.

[HikariKurosawa]

I think the reason to play it should be the same as any other job: because you enjoy the fantasy of it. It's difficult dealing with FOTM players as a dev because if a job like SMN is too viable then everyone plays it for easy performance and they start to complain about the game being too easy or boring. That's part of capitalism and recognizing the weak will of the playerbase for what it is. It should be viable, but it's delicate due to most players "not caring" about what job they play as long as it is the best performing job.

Damage numbers and combat logs kinda ruin the game. All this stuff should be under the hood completely and health bars should just be without values or percentages. Base engagement with content on having sufficient ilvl and leave it at that. Destroy the parsing community.

[Reginald_Cain]

I think the reason to play it should be the same as any other job: because you enjoy the fantasy of it. It's difficult dealing with FOTM players as a dev because if a job like SMN is too viable then everyone plays it for easy performance and they start to complain about the game being too easy or boring. That's part of capitalism and recognizing the weak will of the playerbase for what it is. It should be viable, but it's delicate due to most players "not caring" about what job they play as long as it is the best performing job.

Damage numbers and combat logs kinda ruin the game. All this stuff should be under the hood completely and health bars should just be without values or percentages. Base engagement with content on having sufficient ilvl and leave it at that. Destroy the parsing community.

even if hiding that info was remotely possible or reasonable, it wouldn't solve the problem of a dev team completely out of touch with job design. Machinist's damage and lack of utility has been a huge problem for 3 expansions. Can it clear sure, does it feel good to be a pure dps with peapod sized number no. In a world without parsing I'd still like all dps jobs to either do similar damage or be given tools to excuse doing no damage. Why does it have feel awful to do solo content on machinist like fate grinding and not samurai or another selfish dps like black mage?

[HikariKurosawa]

even if hiding that info was remotely possible or reasonable, it wouldn't solve the problem of a dev team completely out of touch with job design. Machinist's damage and lack of utility has been a huge problem for 3 expansions. Can it clear sure, does it feel good to be a pure dps with peapod sized number no. In a world without parsing I'd still like all dps jobs to either do similar damage or be given tools to excuse doing no damage. Why does it have feel awful to do solo content on machinist like fate grinding and not samurai or another selfish dps like black mage?

Wanna know how to make the game way more fun? Turn the floating combat text off and play for the fantasy of the jobs. Can't tell you're doing "no damage" if you're can't see the damage numbers on any job. Solo content too, everything dies the moment I start to burst on DRG currently or within 2-3 casts of fire 4 on BLM. Is that what you want on MCH? If solo content is a valuable metric of anything, other jobs should be brought down to that level.

MCH does higher aDPS than a lot of jobs. That's the damage you'll be dealing in solo content. It has unique utility in dismantle, on top of another defensive raid buff. I'm not really seeing the problem with MCH. People are crying because their favorite job has the lowest rDPS for some reason. There will always be a job that has the lowest dps, that's unavoidable.

It is very reasonable and possible to hide all that info though, and it would make the game much better. Just like if fflogs were shut down. People think they want fflogs to exist, but the reality is that it is a pure detriment. There is absolutely nothing positive about the existence of fflogs and all it does is reduce the experience of the game. Absolutely reductive.



If you look at nDPS it's even more favorable for MCH. The variance between the lowest parse and the highest parse on MCH is extremely slim relative to other jobs too, which means it's a very low skill expression job. So why is it bad again? What's the problem with it?

[Milea]

Give it dots and tri-disaster + bane back and problem solved

actually egis too but now I cry for the ones we lost :'(

[Jeeqbit]

With how homogenized jobs are and how many we have now, the only reason to play a lot of jobs is because you like the aesthetic. Summoner isn't some special exception.

For myself, I can say the reason I didn't bother with Summoner this expansion is because it had a bit of bloat added to it (the 2 minute attack) and nothing new or interesting (literally another bahamut), while the other casters got actually new things.

[Wayfinder3]

I think too much of the rotation is forced on the GCD that leads to this problem, in order to fix this without doing a full rework, they'd have to basically pull a PCT and put all the damage into the burst phase and ensure SMN can land it for it to be good in fru. Overall, SMN could use a buff but it's positon relative to the melee and it's other casters is fair. it shouldn't do more damage and the other Casters who have to put in far more effort to do their rotations than this class does. So they gotta figure something out here.