(Un)Official Arcanist/Summmoner Feedback Thread

[Kevee]

Aside from giving Summoner itself Contagion to at least make Ifrit more worthwhile to use, they could always give Ifrit an ability that increases the potency of the master's DoTs on the enemy, balanced to do around the same damage as the extended DoTs from Contagion. It'd provide the choice of wanting to have more "bursty" DoTs with the catch that you'd expend more MP in a given timeframe due to reapplying DoTs more often over longer DoTs that conserve MP and can be used to give more leeway for using Bane.

I doubt they have a system in place to be able to do this.

No DoTs function in that way.

It would have to do something stupid like, take a snapshot of your DoTs, get rid of them, and then re-apply them with the snapshotted time.

Not saying it can't be done, but it's silly to try and boost it in that way. Not to mention it would have overly complicated coding because it would have to give more damage to, say, Bio, but less to Bio II.


Edit: I'm not saying it's a bad idea in theory, it's just I don't think FFXIV can implement it well.

[Kikosho]

Considering all the little things that seem to be difficult to implement already, I wouldn't doubt it'd be an undertaking. Though, now that I actually think on it more, I do notice all the little nuances such as taking into account the durations of DoTs for applying the correct potency so it'd stay competitive with Contagion. I suppose they could also give Ifrit a Fester-like buff where he does more AA and/or skill damage depending on the amount of DoTs applied to the enemy. SE needs to do something, especially with more Summons coming down the line.

[Kevee]

SE needs to do something, especially with more Summons coming down the line.

This I can wholeheartedly agree on.

[Saiken]

I am on the edge with changing Contagion to being a Garuda-egi-specific ability to being an ability specifically attributed to the SMN.

On the one hand if garuda loses Contagion and we the SMNs gain it, it will be much easier to balance and the other pets with each other; but loses a synergistic property that, i believe, SE wants with our pets.

On the other hand if garuda keeps Contagion, it will be more difficult/impossible to balance and add new pets that will either be more powerful than garuda(and thusly becoming the new go-to pet) or be utterly useless (due to not being bringing something as good as contagion to the table i.e. Ifrit).

I have put forth ideas of how to implement this, I leave SE to the balancing of the abilities if they do this, and I think they are quite useful and keeps the synergy with SMNs and their pets. I'll just repost them because people seem to have overlooked them/skipped to last page

Ifrit:

Instead of Radiant Shield(dps pet should not get hit) should be an attack that either adds a dot based off the SMNs magic stats OR an attack that reduces the defense of the target hit (I prefer this one myself, as it also helps the DPS of everyone else as well).

Garuda:

I actually hate her knock back, it causes more harm than help. Instead, she should have a party movement speed boost that can be used in combat, lasts 10 seconds with 30-60sec cd(probably 1min)

Ideas for added pets:

Ability that adds potency to all applied dots(shiva maybe?)

Ability that does more damage with more applied dots to the target(similar to fester but all dots not just bio/bio2/miasma, Ramuh maybe?)

these are just ideas that synergize with us, the SMNs. I still think that seeing as how our pets are more supportive in this game, that they should also do things that help support the party as well

Supportive Ideas:

maybe titan should grant a barrier that blocks a certain amount of damage to all party members(60sec-180sec cd? depending on how much is blocked).

I could see Shiva grant additional magic potency, or just potency in general, to all party members for a limited amount of time.

Ramuh could grant additional critical rating to everyone.

I'm uncertain as to what Leviathan would do in this game, but I can see him inducing vulnerability status(similar to virus).

Again, these ideas are if Garuda keeps her contagion. I personally want to see more synergy with the pets as well as them fulfilling the supportive role they've been given(at least that's how I see them).

[pandabearcat]

Just make Ifrit autoattacks give mana back to the caster.

Alternatively, make all of Ifrits autoattacks splash.

Alternatively, make burning shield just an immolation aura instead.

The point is to make the different pets be useful in different situations.

The goal of every pet is "more dps" so regardless of what you do, if all you focus on is "more dps" people will just use that pet.

If you make ifrit do double garuda's damage, people will just use ifrit. That doesn't solve anything.

Better to give them niches. Ifrit for extended engagements, and/or AoE, garuda for single target.

This is how everything works, because of min maxing there will always be exactly one answer for optimal dps on every single situation.

If you want more (or rather, any) of those situations to favor ifrit, you need to be careful not to make it crowd out garuda.

I mean it doesn't even matter what their names are. Its Summon A vs Summon B. THey are "interchangeable" in that if you buff one and its better than the other, it'll just replace it.

So again, niches please, rather than straight up damage increases.

And frankly, don't even care about it. Use ifrit if you want. You'll still be able to kill everything you've been able to before, unless you are on the bleeding edge of being able to down a boss.

[Aphrini]

Here is something I had an idea about the other day while running WP, it has been stated here correctly changes to DPS whether it be Enkindle or other moves would over power us we already do very serious DPS just look at the numbers. However what if they gave us an ability with say a one minute cool down that would similar to swift cast, but instead of casting a spell it would let you swap one Summon for another instantly, this would have no effect what so ever on DPS. Maybe they could then tweek both Garuda and Ifrit or at very least Ifrit to have more standard DPS or whatever and then we could Swap out our summons as the situation demanded it. Example, DPS with Garuda when suddenly tank goes down use swap ability to Titan bam Sic on target PT saved. Ideas on this? I think it would be amazing and useful.

[pandabearcat]

However what if they gave us an ability with say a one minute cool down that would similar to swift cast, but instead of casting a spell it would let you swap one Summon for another instantly, this would have no effect what so ever on DPS.

This is doable with a swiftcast > summon macro, but obviously completely destroys your mana bar.

My thoughts on this are, yes it is a good idea, if only our pets were more differentiated. After all, in WoW, aff locks can burn a shadow crystal (i forgot their actual name, soul shard?) to instares a pet.

Demo has a passive that lets them insta res a pet every minute or two.

Destro is kinda boned but they get chaos bolt (which is the coolest spell ever in any game).

EDIT: oh hey! I had another idea. Have Surecast renamed, and make it instead make the next cast mana free.

It'll make it super awesome for sure > swift > res combos, and great for BLM too because they can sneak in an extra flare.

[Menae]

EDIT: oh hey! I had another idea. Have Surecast renamed, and make it instead make the next cast mana free.

It'll make it super awesome for sure > swift > res combos, and great for BLM too because they can sneak in an extra flare.

Please don't do this; I like surecast on my healer.

[Exstal]

In 5 minutes fester gives you 4500 potency optimally, ignoring raging strikes boosted ones. 300 potency festers hit anywhere between 800-2k depending on gear, crits, RS, etc but lets assume a common 1k damage fester. Enkindle would be doing around 15k ignoring rouse, spur and crits.

I think this begs a new question, do we even know the damage cap? I'm assuming they didn't do the traditional 9999 since it's been ignored or able to be ignored in most FFs since X

Also I'm not saying i agree with doing that kind of change, but it's certainly neat to think about

Ok, remove Fester completely and take a video of SE all sitting in a room laughing in their chairs.

[Akiza]

The real issue is that all the jobs are there base class with a few job related skills. A Summoner job upgrade would add scaled down versions of the primal which will give Summoner's high aoe burst and Damage over time.

Ifrit:
Incinerate
Burning Strike
Radiant Plume
Volcano Blast
Crimson Cyclone
Eruption
A passive ability that increases damage of the entire party
Ultimate attack: Inferno which does 5k damage

Garuda:
Slip Stream
Wind blade
Mistral Song
Downburt
Thousand Feathers Razor Plumes
Wicked Wheel which summons three clockwise rotating tornados
Passive ability: adds haste and blink to the entire party
Ultimate attack: Aerial Blast which does 5k damage

Titan:
Mountain Buster
Weight of the land
Bomb Boulders
Goal
Geocrush
Land Slide
Passive ability increase defense of the entire party
Ultimate attack: Earthen Fury which does 5k damage

Of course they would add more job focus abilities to the Black Mage and other jobs to balance everything out.