Summoner Job Identity and Yet Another Rework

[OpticNerve]

There is no way I will be able to fit the full rework into the 3000 character limit of a forum post, and I'm not spending any more time using HTML formatting than absolutely necessary. Please refer to [THIS] published Google Doc for the full rework, and throw any feedback or suggestions in the comments. I will make no mention of specific potencies, with some mentions of effect durations, because I am not a game designer, nor am I fully versed in game balancing. Think of this as the skeleton and muscle of a rework. The outline). THIS WILL REQUIRE A FULL REWORK OF THE ACN/SMN CLASS/JOB QUESTLINES. (which unfortunately makes this a very unlikely thing to happen).

Abstract

Pet Problems

You are Carbie. Carbie is you. From a purely technical standpoint, you and your summons will be one entity. Summons are no longer pets, but an extension of you as a player. This should circumvent the pet delay issue by simply making your summon a proxy for abilities that the game considers you to be casting and simply making them the origin point for the animation and effects. This will give the illusion of being a pet-based job while hopefully not dealing with the delay drawback.

The Core

Multi-name gauge which goes by the general term Summon Gauge, starts as Elemental Gauge. Build gauge by landing Summon actions (including Carbie's), by landing Ruin while under the effects of Aethercharge, and through your Brand New DoT, Drain. Full gauge grants 1 stack of Elemental Fury, allowing you to summon one of your three elemental Carbie forms (Fire, Wind, Earth, as usual). Elemental Gauge becomes Primal Gauge. When full, summon the Primal related to your elemental form (Ifrit, Garuda, Titan). Once the Primal dissipates, return to Elemental Stance and gain one stack of Primal Aether (replacing the mostly useless Aetherflow gauge) and put the used summon on cooldown, repeat for the next Primal. Upon completing two Primal summons, based on the last element stored in your Primal Aether Guage, the corresponding summon button upgrades into an Improved Primal Summon (Ifrit > Ramuh, Garuda > Leviathan, Titan > Shiva).

During your Improved Primal Stance, the Summon Gauge becomes the Eikon Gauge. Once again, fill the gauge to transform your currently active summon action into an Eikon summon (Ramuh > [Read], Leviathan > [The], Shiva > [Doc]. During each Primal Summon, every 25 or 50% of the respective gauge you fill, you gain one use of a summon-specific ability, and each Eikon performs a unique attack when it dissipates.

[OpticNerve]

Formatting this sucked

[Exinias]

Wait, you're not at level cap and you made a job rework?

[Supersnow845]

Wait, you're not at level cap and you made a job rework?

Isn’t it amazing. You don’t even need to be capped to understand how much of a trashfire SMN is

[OpticNerve]

I'm intentionally hanging back at the moment to catch up all my other jobs (and cause I just don't wanna end off the EW arc of the story just yet). Things like this are a hobby of mine, so it's by no means the first thing I've ever attempted to design/redesign. It is the first I've made public, though. And, as little actual experience as it gives, I do watch the guides to have an at least baseline understanding of what is going on

[Rithy255]

Wait, you're not at level cap and you made a job rework?

Funnily enough not everyone only has one character you can make multiple... wild I know.

[Khryseis_Astra]

At this point I’m not picky… I’d put up with just about anything to get Levi, Shiva and Ramuh added. Although I think the less complicated route (for the devs anyway) would be to actually USE the framework they created with the last rework and make them additional gem summons.

But in the end, the joy of having a full elemental cast of summons would make me happy enough to overlook whatever nitpicks I have with however it’s done… at least for awhile! lol

[OpticNerve]

At this point I’m not picky… I’d put up with just about anything to get Levi, Shiva and Ramuh added. Although I think the less complicated route (for the devs anyway) would be to actually USE the framework they created with the last rework and make them additional gem summons.

But in the end, the joy of having a full elemental cast of summons would make me happy enough to overlook whatever nitpicks I have with however it’s done… at least for awhile! lol

I guess my view of it is that, sometimes, things need to be torn out at the roots in order for it to grow into a more healthy position. It would be great to use the current framework, but packing 30 actions into one button just seems like it's gonna get old pretty quickly. Even my rework had that problem where a bunch of stuff would all end up on the same buttons like normal just to prevent bloat, which may require a far more Scorched Earth-style approach in order to address properly. Ideally, we leave the important, core buttons as action change/overwrite, then have the fun stuff be the extra buttons, like with Viper, since the Summoner's main focus isn't really on the spells they themselves cast. But before any of that can happen, they've gotta address the issues with the core pet mechanic itself. Unsustainable at best. I know it's existed since the game began, but there's a far better way. My fix may not be that way, but there has to be something

For a bit more clarity now that I've though it over after posting this: The current SMN framework is standing on rotting supports, and what Square implemented in Endwalker is a shim. It was a necessary step to keep the job afloat while they redesign it, but it cannot be anything more than that. Summoner is in desperate need of a more stable foundation. It is in the process of collapsing in on itself, and if Square keeps piling more weight onto the current foundation, it will self-destruct

[Brandr]

Hard agree on "simply making them the origin point for the animation and effects. This will give the illusion of being a pet-based job"

[OpticNerve]

Hard agree on "simply making them the origin point for the animation and effects. This will give the illusion of being a pet-based job"

It's, like, I get how cool the concept of them being independent entities is, but a little flair and an objectively minor mechanic that nobody notices nor appreciates is far from worth the drawbacks that come with it