And once again.... NO Avatar!

[Armando]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

They just need something to do while perpetuating.

If SE would've just given each pact its own timer (and possibly reworking the amount of damage pacts do at 0 TP for balance) this wouldn't have been an issue.

SNM bosses have those "Aura" effects, after all.

Nah, that's just the zone they're in.

[Darkhound]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

Reducing perpetuation cost would be something very very useful.
I mean PUPs and BST have their pets out for longer time then us... why cant we?

Atomos.... zeiro can you develop furgther please

[Ketaru]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

I mean PUPs and BST have their pets out for longer time then us... why cant we?

I know it's popular to downplay the costs, but the pets that are remotely good in group situations cost money. And we're unable to select the abilities our pets use. And they can't use them unless they have 100 TP. And they don't have remotely the amount of versatliity avatars have.

[Armando]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

And Sic is on a 2-minute timer anyways, which is about twice as long as it should take someone with good hit rate to hit 100 TP.

[Aksannyi]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

I think a party-wide bonus just for having a summon present is a splendid idea. Not something that would completely fix the job, but it would definitely go towards giving incentives to actually keeping summons active.

Indeed, I can't believe it's never been thought of (or that I've never seen it) because it's so simple, really. It might make some of the RDMs QQ because of the added enspell (but how many RDMs melee post-Refresh anyway), and some of the BP:Wards which give enspell bonuses would need to be changed, but seriously I think it would be cool. A little added damage bonus for having an avatar smacking a mob. It could even work similarly to DNCs Daze effects, in that they have to be constantly hitting it for the Daze to remain active and allow the party members to receive the buff, not just having the avatar out and chilling.

I really don't think that SMNs need anything massive in terms of DD, they have very powerful spike damage but it's just difficult to maintain. Elemental siphon was a nice addition to SMN. Perhaps there could be some sort of added MP restoring ability. Perhaps if an avatar crits, it restores half of that amount to the SMN's MP? So assuming Ifrit crits for 56, the SMN gets 28 MP back off that crit or something. It would make the avatars last a bit longer, but wouldn't really break anything, at least in any major sort of way, and it would be a slight encouragement to keeping avatars out and meleeing.

[Armando]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

Actually I would like to see the SMN get back some MP when the Avatar gets struck by damage of its element (proportional to damage, so you can't do something retarded like get infinite MP off of mobs with Blaze Spikes.) It would give further incentive to keep Avatars out - for example, if you don't mind not exploiting their elemental weakness, you could keep Ifrit out against Goblins for more MP endurance

I think the whole idea of using the avatars' elemental attributes is completely underplayed right now beyond the use of their BPs and Astral Flows. Your idea works just as well, but I'd like to see a bit more strategy to which Avatar to leave out.

[Aksannyi]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

Hell even Astral Flow kinda ignores the entire elemental weakness thing, same as regular nukes do. You're better off using AF with the same element as the day than trying to find the weakness of the mob, which is flawed in itself.

[Yellow Mage]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

Are you expecting some amazing new avatar that is going to totally revamp the way Summoner is played in all aspects of the game?

If SE would've just given each pact its own timer (and possibly reworking the amount of damage pacts do at 0 TP for balance) this wouldn't have been an issue.

I want to emphasize these.

[Tickmeoff]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

Reducing perpetuation cost would be something very very useful.
I mean PUPs and BST have their pets out for longer time then us... why cant we?

When your Avatar dies, you don't have to:

A) Wait 20 minutes
B) Hunt down another Even Match monster
C) Expend gil

Honestly, I think the perpetuation cost should be totally reworked anyway, but I don't like when people compare the pet jobs and assume they should all have equal ability in a given aspect of play.

[Karinya]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

Reducing perpetuation cost would be something very very useful.
I mean PUPs and BST have their pets out for longer time then us... why cant we?

Because those jobs are designed to work differently than SMN?

Perpetuation costs and the existence of Blood Pact are obviously intended to create a job that plays very differently from BST. If you want a job that has a pet with them constantly, why don't you play BST? Or DRG?

What more do you want, an interview where the devs actually say "We never intended for SMN to keep their avatars out all the time"? They've said it with their actions about as clearly as it is possible to do.

Carbuncle is not the same as HareFamiliar. Carbuncle is not intended to be used the same way as HareFamiliar. These are not things that SE will or should "fix" because they are not problems in the first place, they are design decisions. The design of SMN involves steep tradeoffs for keeping avatars out for long periods of time, but allows them to have a substantial effect on a fight even if they are not kept out for very long (both through spike damage/healing, and through buffs/debuffs that continue to contribute to the fight after the avatar has been released). This produces different sets of useful tactics for SMN than it does for BST. This is intentional and a good thing - jobs that are too similar are boring.

SMN avatars and BST pets are as different as cure and samba. Which one of those needs to be fixed to work the same as the other? If you want BST, you know where to find it. And if you don't like SMN the way it is designed, why did you level it?

[Malacite]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

Bahamut will never be a playable summon and
spoiler

yeah I just read that, as I'm coming up to the fight. I still think it will be weak if it really is Atomos...

either finish the celestials or the terrestrials please. Besides, we've only gotten avatars from 1 expansion so far, which was CoP and there are still 2 left in that set (I don't count Zilart as an expansion as Tanaka himself said they intended for Zilart to be a part of the original game but ran out of room. That, and carbuncle was available before the release so if you want you can say we've gotten avatars from 2 expansions)

Needs ToAU avatars before WotG!

Giga Flare & Rebirth Flame, or Zantetsuken & Divine Judgmment please and thanks =3 Seriously not interested in Atomos in the least...


Seriously, AoE Raise 3 (no weakness full restoration) and fire damage FTMFW Phoenix

---------- Post added at 04:59 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:52 PM ----------

No no no no no no no no no. No more of this "ludicrious spike damage at the expense of large amount of MP" business. That just leads to SMN burns in BCs and introduces nothing new to SMN gameplay.

Very true, though it's still fun as hell. Go go Astral burns! Actually, I don't think that notion is entirely out of line either. I mean if you think about it, BLMs can already do this despite the NM magic nerf in large numbers, and without the need for their 2 hours. It would all depend on how SE handles the MP to Effect ratios.

---------- Post added at 05:12 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:59 PM ----------

Okay given it more thought and here's what I've got. Some of it is rehashing what's already said but here goes;

- Separate BP timers for every pact, please. Put a slight delay between pacts as well so you can't just Astral Flow and go nuts... speaking of which, Astral Flow should make all BP's used with maximum effect regardless of TP/skill.

- Each Celestial Avatar should absorb damage of their element, healing them.

- Celestials should also have either an automatic enspell effect (their elemental gods for Christ sake) and/or their own Enspell buff that far surpasses what SCH can do with Accession. It's only fair IMO (and could have interesting implications, maybe even get SMN into TP burns O.o)


- Increase Hastega's max duration to at least 2 minutes, and jack up the MP cost accordingly if needed.

- Having a specific avatar out should influence PT members; some people have suggested weather effects, what about stat boosts? Fire governs STR & Attack, so how about a passive attack boost for keeping ifrit out? Nothing as potent as say double minuet or an XI Chaos Roll, but powerful enough to warrant spending the MP keeping him out. Limit it to 1 avatar effect at a time, or at least no opposing elements (i.e. Ifrit will cancel out shiva)

- Carbuncle will give a passive Regen Effect, while Fenrir will give a 1/tic Refresh to everyone else. These abilities shouldn't stack either (i.e. if 1 Fenrir is out already, a 2nd will do nothing) Can't think of anything for Diabolos... TP regeneration would be cool but Regain is a white magic spell so doesn't fit. Maybe he could enhance dark/enfeebling effects???

- Adjust the weaker pacts please like Crimson Howl and especially Whispering Wind.

---------- Post added at 05:20 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:12 PM ----------

When your Avatar dies, you don't have to:

A) Wait 20 minutes
B) Hunt down another Even Match monster
C) Expend gil

Honestly, I think the perpetuation cost should be totally reworked anyway, but I don't like when people compare the pet jobs and assume they should all have equal ability in a given aspect of play.

To be fair, all of those other jobs are actually capable of fighting on their own. Unless you're a safe distance away or have some kind of item/trick up your sleeve you may as well just pull your pants down, bend over and accept it. And all the other pet jobs can instantly call a new pet back if the timer is up for that matter.

[DakAttack]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

Carbuncle> Enlight, Regen
Diabolos> Endark, Refresh
Fenrir> No enspell, atk/acc + m.atk/m.acc Up

Everything else, Enspell and environmental change.

Alas, we may never see it happen.

[Armando]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

Karinya: SMN isn't broken. It's kind of lame though. In the same way that BRD is lame. Repeat the same buffs over and over. Riveting strategy. A fucking rainbow of avatars and they're of no consequence except for the usefulness of their pacts, which is more or less independent of what you're fighting. Don't you think that's pretty silly?

Actually most of our jobs are pretty lame to play and could use reinventing gameplay-wise (I'm lookin atchu, WAR). But alas, we probably won't see that either.

[Malacite]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

Actually most of our jobs are pretty lame to play and could use reinventing gameplay-wise (I'm lookin atchu, WAR). But alas, we probably won't see that either.

Of course not, they're saving the good stuff for XIV > - >

---------- Post added at 07:47 PM ---------- Previous post was at 07:44 PM ----------

Carbuncle> Enlight, Regen
Diabolos> Endark, Refresh
Fenrir> No enspell, atk/acc + m.atk/m.acc Up

Slight problem here. SE really screwed up by giving Carbuncle Searing light since Alexander also has a Light AoE AF, and is traditionally the Light Element attacker in the series. Furthermore, in XI he's also the Celestial of Light, and Odin is the Celestial of Dark.

Carby and Fenny don't actually govern the elements they're aligned with, as they're not celestials so giving them enlight/endark just because we can't summon Odin or Alex doesn't fit thematically. And I would give any MAB/MACC aura to Diabolos since he already has Dream Shroud.

[Tickmeoff]

Re: And once again.... NO Avatar!

Actually most of our jobs are pretty lame to play and could use reinventing gameplay-wise (I'm lookin atchu, WAR). But alas, we probably won't see that either.

You know, when FFXI first came to NA I always thought it felt like EverQuest was a beta test for FFXI. Melee DD pretty much just auto attack almost all the time, the one true healer job in the game was both the most highly sought after job for parties and had surprisingly good melee capabilities for a mage job, there was a jack of all trades type job (EQs was Druid) and leveling up basically meant stand around and hope someone invites you to a party because you don't have a chance in hell of soloing anything near your level unless you are one of few jobs that had solo potential. EQ had all these things and FFXI took them all and did them better, and while looking 80000x better too.

Now it feels the opposite way. EQ has taken a lot of steps to try and keep up with the standards newer MMOs have set, but FFXI is still kind of floating around in it's own little world.


Anyway, that was off topic.

So uh.. SMN is cool guys. I think in the next update we should get Bahamut, Alexander, and as a surprise cameo from FFX, Valefor! Astral Flow should also be on a 5 minute timer, and we should get a new 2 hour that allows us to summon all Avatars at once with no perpetuation cost and no recast time or MP cost for blood pacts. This will definitely fix SMN.