(Un)Official Arcanist/Summmoner Feedback Thread

[Spellbinder]

Hello my fellow adventurers.

It's been a long time coming. After main teasers, screenshots, and trailers, we're finally able to play arcanist and summoner!

However, because there was no opportunity to test them during beta, we never had an opportunity to test how they perform and give feedback on this new class / job combination. Overall, I enjoy arcanist and summoner, and plan to make them my main class and job. But that doesn't mean there isn't room for improvement. And so, I've created this thread to see if we can't have some civil discussion on ways to give feedback on them and see if they can't be improved.

Before we get started, I only have one thing to ask of any who post here:

Please keep discussion civil, and be respectful to your fellow posters.
This thread is for feedback. There are no trolls, white knights, black knights, derps, etc. here. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. It's okay to disagree, but please no attacking or provocative language.

With that out of the way, here are a few things that I feel should be addressed.

Aesthetics
During the beta test, I made a post in the feedback forums asking that the Egi be scaled up slightly. My English post received roughly 680 likes, and my Japanese post received roughly 140 likes, so while this isn't some phantom majority, there is interest in seeing some sort of change.

Just as a brief recap of that post, the reason I think many people are disappointed with the look of the Egi is pretty easy to understand considering the legacy of the FINAL FANTASY franchise. Summoners and their summons have always had an image of something grand and fantastical. However, because this is an MMO and there will be situations where there are many people fighting together in the same area, it would be wrong to use giant skyscraper summons.

Making completely different models would cost the team a lot of time and energy, which is why I proposed scaling their size as an easier solution that actually has pretty good results.

First I'd like to show you an image a beta tester was nice enough to create.

This is to give an idea of what was asked for, which was not a giant behemoth-sized summon.

For a better idea of what they could look like, here is a second example provided by another beta tester.

I think it would also help if the model floated a little lower to the ground, but its easy to see how scaling it up adds a certain sense of ferocity that I think players were expecting.

To close out this point on aesthetics, I'd like to also mention that changes of this nature are not without precedent. Although it happened in the previous iteration of this game, the 1.16 patch in March 2011 increased the size of monsters in the world because people were disatisfied them. The following month, patch 1.17 increased the size of spell and action effects.

Actions and Their Mechanics

Again, just my opinion, but I feel that the summoner job does not have enough emphasis on the summons, but it can be done with a bit of effort. First I'd like to address one point regarding the transition from Carbuncle to Egi by looking at their skills.

Emerald Carbuncle (black) vs. Garuda-Egi (red)

gust - attack with 90 potency
wind blade - attack with 100 potency

backdraft - knockback attack with 80 potency
shockwave - knockback attakc with 90 potency

downburst - aoe attack with 80 potency
aerial slash - aoe attack with 90 potency

shining emerald - extends debuff duration by 15 seconds
contagion - extends debuff duration by 15 seconds

Topaz Carbuncle (black) vs. Titan-Egi (red)

gouge - attack with 70 potency that builds enmity
rock buster - attack with 85 potency that builds enmity

shining topaz - aoe attack with 70 potency that builds enmity
mountain buster - aoe attack with 70 potency that builds enmity

curl - reduces damage taken by 20% (20 seconds with 120 second cooldown)
earthen ward - reduces damage taken by 20% (20 seconds with 120 second cooldown)

storm - attack with 60 potency that stuns
landslide - attack with 70 potency that stuns

The similarity in their skills is disheartening, if not disturbing. As many higher level summoners already know, in order to unlock an Egi through the summoner quests, you must first defeat the corresponding primal in the main scenario. Considering learning the spells to summon these Egi has such a stiff requirement, I would expect them to be more than simply reskinned carbuncles. So what can we do to fix this?

An obvious suggestion (but hard to implement) would be to change either the carbuncle skills, the Egi skills, or a mixture of both.

For example, Emerald Carbuncle could keep Backdraft (knockback), while Garuda Egi learns a direct damage or damage over time attack that binds or debuffs an enemy.

I'm no game designer so I can't give a thorough outlining on how to address this issue, but my point here is that there needs to be a greater distinction between the carbuncles and the Egi than adding 10 potency to their attacks and a small Egi reskin.

Any thoughts on how to improve the distinction between the carbuncles and their Egi counterparts are more than welcome.

Edit: Here is another example of how a change to Ifrit's skills could add some utility, thereby giving summoners incentive to use skills rather than just setting Ifrit Egi to auto-attack.

Ifrit-Egi

Crimson Cyclone - attack with 105 potency (stun)
Burning Strike - attack with 120 potency
Radiant Shield - reflect damage (50 potency dealt when hit)
Flaming Crush - aoe attack with 105 potency

What if these skills were changed or adjusted to be worth using?

Crimson Cyclone - attack with 105 potency (stun)
Burning Strike - attack with 120 potency
Flash Fire - frontal cone attack with 110 potency; additional effect: physical defense down for 10 seconds
Flaming Crush - aoe attack with 105 potency; additional effect: fire damage over time

It would also help if their cooldowns were all 10 ~ 30 seconds (with the standard attack still at 3).

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Overlapping Timers

First let me talk about the pet hotbar. At the moment we cannot edit it, although we're free to drag the Egi action icons from the Actions and Traits menu to any other hotbar we like. Looking at the pet hotbar, however, its very easy to notice that the timers for the different Egi actions are linked based on their location on the hotbar.

For example, Titan-Egi has a 30 second cooldown skill in slot A. Garuda-Egi has a 90 second cooldown skill in slot A. If I use Garuda-Egi's ability then switch to Titan-Egi, I am bound by the 90 second cooldown because they share the same slot.

Personally, I think this is a hinderance and should be removed if possible.

Looking at the actual summoner, there are three skills in particular I think could do with a bit of adjustment.

Rouse vs. Spur

Both of these skills increase damage of Egi by 40%. At level 50, one of them has a 60 second cooldown (Rouse), the other has a 90 second cooldown (Spur). They both essentially do the same thing, but I would like to think the skill with a longer cooldown has some sort of extra benefit.

In truth its quite the contrary. Rouse, the ability with a 60 second cooldown also gives the Egi resistance to stun, sleep, bind, heavy, paralysis, and disease. If the team insists on them both being a 40% damage increase that's fine, but logically, shouldn't the one with the longer cooldown have the greater benefit?

Enkindle (SMN) vs Flare (BLM) ?

The final summoner skill that allows Egi to use their trademark attacks. Depending on which Egi uses it, you get an aoe attack with roughly 200 to 300 potency on a 300 second cooldown. On the other hand, black mage has Flare, with a potency of 260, and a cooldown of 2.5 seconds. While yes, it costs a black mage all their remaining MP and is situational, it can be utilized when their MP is low and can be used with much greater frequency, giving black mage a clear edge for a high damage situational attack. I only bring this up as it looks somewhat unbalanced between our two casting DPS classes.

Phew, and I think that sums it up for me. Feel free to like this post if you agree with its points. If something is inaccurate or you disagree with a certain point, you're welcome to point it out and we'll get the ball rolling. The game has just started and there's always room for adjustments in an MMO. Hopefully we can give the developers some good feedback to improve any shortcomings this class and job may have.

Dot Limitations
Update: As of 2.1, enemies can now be affected by a maximum of 60 DoTs.

Limitation of Bane
Update: This has been noted as working as intended, and the tooltip has been updated to reflect this.