Summoner is a joke. Fun as hell... but a joke.

[Nerva Matapan]

I thought RDM was caster easy-mode, but my God - summoner is just silly. 95 percent of the abilities are instants; 75 percent of the spells are linked to two buttons (single target or AOE). Running around in circles and slapping monsters with your book wouldn't be significantly more complex.

I'm not in any way saying this isn't fun - it is. It's very freeing, much the same way as dancer (although dancer at least requires some thought to conserve/spend resources). But SMN is just ridiculous. It feels like FFXIV - practice mode.

[Sardorim]

Originally posted by Deadpool:

Summoner USED to be more complex and have way more to it. They recently changed it and oooft, it's bad. They absolutely stripped it down to nothing.

They changed it because it didn't focus on summons but DoTs and most players hated it. After the rework Summoner became the #1 most played Ranged Magical DPS Job by far.

So the rework was a success.

[xyz]

Waiting like 6 years for more egi glamour....

[Nerva Matapan]

Originally posted by Axetwin:

Originally posted by rabureta:

SMN is slow, though. BLM gets teleports, and RDM gets dashes and backflips, but SMN has to hoof it at base speed, which can get painfully tight when you have to run out to Africa to resolve a mechanic. God help you if you're caught in Ruby when it happens, since your only swiftcast is, well, swiftcast, and you probably used it on Slipstream to fit Slipstream in your pot window.

Don't get me wrong, I love SMN, but goddamn do things like Fourfold Fires and Gale Spheres make me wish I were playing BLM instead sometimes.

The counter to this is, Summoner is more naturally mobile than Black Mage. It's far easier to move with the pack, and knowing when to use Ruby is the only real consideration the job has. Which means there's basically no reason why you should get caught in a spot you shouldn't be.

I concur with this. The thing about summoner is that, while playing it, I'm practically always moving. If I'm not taxing the healer by running out of range, there's no reason NOT to move. And thus I am almost always moving out of a mechanic as it is being laid.

Yes, RDM and BLM have movement-specific utilities. But they're also hard-casting a ton. And, as a result, there's always that split second where you have to say to yourself "can I get this spell off AND still make it out of this AOE?" (And the answer is often: "Yes!"). Summoner doesn't even need to consider it. Just nope right on out of there.

[Consul]

i agree. summoner was the class i started with, and I really hate what they did to it with endwalker. the big summons are cool, and the abilities feel nice and chunky to cast, but it's so unimaginably boring. it was more engaging in the past trying to keep your dots up or using different summons depending on the situation.

[MOSLEY]

Originally posted by Axetwin:

Originally posted by Kiana:

The main problem with DoTs as a job's core identity is how much of the end game is designed around burst phases and buff windows. If a job is all about sustained damage, to the point that is struggles with tight DPS check phases, that basically rules it out of any savage fight with an add phase.

I feel like a fix for burst phases would be to give a dot heavy class a way to blow up all the dots they currently have running on a specific target (or targets). A skill that ends all dots on a target dealing their full damage all at once, and it could have a 90 second cooldown.

If it was 90 seconds, you wouldn't have it for 2, 4, 8 and 10 minute burst windows. Pretty much everything has to be 30, 60 or 120 seconds now to make it fit within the current (bad) design model.

[Kiana]

Originally posted by Nep deus Darnus:

i agree. summoner was the class i started with, and I really hate what they did to it with endwalker. the big summons are cool, and the abilities feel nice and chunky to cast, but it's so unimaginably boring. it was more engaging in the past trying to keep your dots up or using different summons depending on the situation.

The ever engaging gameplay of 'remember to cast miasma and bio' and 'use ifrit most the time.' Oh, and losing GCDs to healing your egi, because they had health bars and AoEs would shred them.

If it's a choice between remembering when Ifrit's gap closer will get you killed and mixing a 2 and 3 in between all the mashing 1 for ruin spam, I'll take the gap closer 100% of the time.

[Катюша]

Previous Summoner was better, but that's not a hard feat compared to the new version. New Summoner feels like it was designed for five year olds.

Actually makes me worried for any more upcoming changes. Astrologian has already been butchered more times than I can count, and Dragoon is on the chopping block next.

[Axetwin]

Originally posted by MOSLEY:

If it was 90 seconds, you wouldn't have it for 2, 4, 8 and 10 minute burst windows. Pretty much everything has to be 30, 60 or 120 seconds now to make it fit within the current (bad) design model.

That was just a for instance example. If you have a dot heavy job, then obviously the job mechanic would potentially revolve around actually doing something extra with the dots. OGCD skills that deal more damage per unique dot on a target. Or the job gimmick could be something similar to how thunderhead works with BLM but for all their dots over the span of 10 seconds. Point is there are ways to make a dot heavy class work and still have it contribute in all phases of a fight and be competitive DPS wise.

[rabureta]

Originally posted by Axetwin:

Originally posted by rabureta:

SMN is slow, though. BLM gets teleports, and RDM gets dashes and backflips, but SMN has to hoof it at base speed, which can get painfully tight when you have to run out to Africa to resolve a mechanic. God help you if you're caught in Ruby when it happens, since your only swiftcast is, well, swiftcast, and you probably used it on Slipstream to fit Slipstream in your pot window.

Don't get me wrong, I love SMN, but goddamn do things like Fourfold Fires and Gale Spheres make me wish I were playing BLM instead sometimes.

The counter to this is, Summoner is more naturally mobile than Black Mage. It's far easier to move with the pack, and knowing when to use Ruby is the only real consideration the job has. Which means there's basically no reason why you should get caught in a spot you shouldn't be.

Oh absolutely, SMN has the most mobile uptime of the casters. It'm just saying that, when BLM or RDM makes a mistake, they have buttons to correct it. When SMN makes a mistake, they're stuck eating it.

MCH has the same problem, where as RDPS you're expected to run to a tower on the other side of the arena, but unlike DNC's dash and BRD's backflip they don't have any actual movement abilities other than basic walking. MCH has so many problems, though...

[AH-1 Cobra]

As a free player with a level cap of 60, Summoner is probably the strongest DPS class out of the bunch. Also, at level 70, Summoner gets Akh Morn (1300 power attack), so they'll be really good in Stormblood with a 70 cap as well.

You only get screwed on mobility with summoner on ruby ruin, and you should be quick casting for one of them. Worst case scenario, in some fights you might have to drop a 2nd ruby ruin cast to not get hit, and this should happen extremely infrequently.

[Consul]

Originally posted by Kiana:

Originally posted by Nep deus Darnus:

i agree. summoner was the class i started with, and I really hate what they did to it with endwalker. the big summons are cool, and the abilities feel nice and chunky to cast, but it's so unimaginably boring. it was more engaging in the past trying to keep your dots up or using different summons depending on the situation.

The ever engaging gameplay of 'remember to cast miasma and bio' and 'use ifrit most the time.' Oh, and losing GCDs to healing your egi, because they had health bars and AoEs would shred them.

If it's a choice between remembering when Ifrit's gap closer will get you killed and mixing a 2 and 3 in between all the mashing 1 for ruin spam, I'll take the gap closer 100% of the time.

i genuinely believe that to be more fun than the mindless button mashing it has turned into - that being said I feel like the class represents what it is in other final fantasy games better now, summoning a powerful attack.

[Geralt]

Originally posted by Sardorim:

Originally posted by Deadpool:

Summoner USED to be more complex and have way more to it. They recently changed it and oooft, it's bad. They absolutely stripped it down to nothing.

They changed it because it didn't focus on summons but DoTs and most players hated it. After the rework Summoner became the #1 most played Ranged Magical DPS Job by far.

So the rework was a success.

Dumbing down the class to two buttons that change depending on your summon is absolutely a success to the player base that got mechanics removed from most dungeons.

[Stormy Dawn]

Originally posted by Deadpool:

Originally posted by Sardorim:

They changed it because it didn't focus on summons but DoTs and most players hated it. After the rework Summoner became the #1 most played Ranged Magical DPS Job by far.

So the rework was a success.

Dumbing down the class to two buttons that change depending on your summon is absolutely a success to the player base that got mechanics removed from most dungeons.

Comments like that make me realize no one actually sits and thinks about what they are saying before the start spewing out crap. Yeah. A couple of buttons, as opposed to? What?

One of the "complicated" melee where it is usually 1, 2, 3? Or maybe 1, 2, that can branch out to two different 3s? And you can throw an oGCD out every so often? Yeah. That's so remarkably more complicated and big-brain.

It's fine to think Summoner is simplistic, but don't go acting like any other class in this game is somehow too complicated for the lowly masses.

[Chashmodai]

Who cares how simplistic it is as long as it is fun? And it clearly is seeing how popular of a job it is. People enjoy playing it. That's what it is all about in the end.

[causality]

Originally posted by Tsurayu:

Originally posted by Deadpool:

Dumbing down the class to two buttons that change depending on your summon is absolutely a success to the player base that got mechanics removed from most dungeons.

Comments like that make me realize no one actually sits and thinks about what they are saying before the start spewing out crap. Yeah. A couple of buttons, as opposed to? What?

One of the "complicated" melee where it is usually 1, 2, 3? Or maybe 1, 2, that can branch out to two different 3s? And you can throw an oGCD out every so often? Yeah. That's so remarkably more complicated and big-brain.

It's fine to think Summoner is simplistic, but don't go acting like any other class in this game is somehow too complicated for the lowly masses.

Well other jobs are mechanically more complex than summoner, that is just a fact. It has also been proven by a 1 button orange parse combat macro. Please replicate this feat with Ninja, Dark Knight and Bard.