[Tahkisis]

Although I agree that an avatars damage, or overall damage for that matter isn't quite

worth what a SMN puts into it, I kinda disagree with what people want to change.



People say that an avatars Black Magic spells should do just as much damage as a

Black Mages spells of that level. By doing this however....of what real use is a BLM?



People say that avatars regular melee attacks should do as much as the other jobs

do. But by doing this, what use are job's like DRK, who simply do melee damage.



I've noticed some ppl wanted summoners to have the ability to solo more like a BST.

Of what use is a BST by making that change.

Although most SMN would like these

changes, I don't think people put into consideration that, by making these changes a SMN

would become 3-4 jobs in one, making those jobs irelevant.

I'm just like anyone

else, this job is definetly in need. But only in need of more support spells, less MP

consumption (or none), and a bit more damage for what the spells cost.

My only beef

is, the only real use for SMN is Cure Tanking, Mass Blink, and Mass Stone SKinn (Maybe even

a Hastega in there). So, when do the other avatars become useful? Anyone else feel this

way?

[Matheau]

I think

of Summoner a lot like Red Mage. You can't nuke as well as a BLM, you can't melee as good

as a melee, you can't heal as well as a WHM, but you do have one thing no one else can do

as well. With RDM in is enfeeble and self enhance. With Summoner it is party enhance.



The problem is the game is geared towards fighting Toughs not ITs. My Wyvern is

decent extra damage against IT, but when I'm going against Tough and below it is better

then some party members. Summoner is the same with avatars Tough and below and you are good

with melee and magic, but a little more trick against IT since you can't buff avatars as

well as a character can buff themselves.

I would also like to note that as far as

I've heard the Summoning skill only effects Blood Pacts. Now most Summoners have very low

Summoning skill (especially the ones that barely use Summons to begin with). Thus people

without a capped skill are seeing very weak use from the non-buff Blood Pacts. Anyone using

a skill which is not well leveled against ITs will not see much from it except skill gain.

Just my thoughts.

[Tahkisis]

I

aggree about the SMN being a party buffer. But the thing is....they need more party buffs

lol. Each avatar needs it's own unique party buff (that's actually worth using). Because

I mean comon, how good is Spring Water (Leviathon's area cure/esuna) compared to Garuda's

mass blink? Or titan's stone skin?

I would be happy with that. Just one very

good party buff for each summon!

[Rensei Ryo]

I

think Summoner is just fine the way it is now. It cuts down on downtime and has talents that

are effective no matter what level you are. The minute we start making the jobs that can do

a little bit of everything just as good as the specialists... it will just turn into another

balance nightmare like Shadowbane.

That game is the best example. Healers dominated

all other classes with little effort. If any of you are vets of Shadowbane, just think of

the Channeler before you say a class is underpowered.

[Heero_yuy1000]

well, for lev. it depends how much cure and how many stats esuna effects, if it heals say

... 500hp to all at lvl 60 and also removes all - stat effects, it would be godly

[Discordian]

Most

of these are vaild points that were made in other posts. Summoner has a support role just

like rdm has a support role. It is on the opposite end of the support spectrum.



Rdm priorities
enfeebling
healing
enhancing / nuking

Summoner

priorities
Enhancing
healing

[wigglestyx]

The

prob seems to be (to me) that you spend all this time/trouble trying to get an avatar that

once you get it, it doesnt do as much damage as you think it should.

Id like to see

some low lvl summons (not the elemental ones)

That you can beat with a party of 20/

30/40

That way you have your starting job, get SMN at 30 level up with it and get

some avatars
So you dont have to have another job at 60 or so that you used to get one of

the other avatars (Garuda, Titan, etc.)

[Wickett]

I'm

gonna keep this short and to the point. SMN is a broken class... Square has admitted it,

every high lvl JP knows it, and all the career SMNs on this forum (Meiyu, Liquid, myself,

Strungout, etc.) keep telling you people about it. None of the career SMNs here have

proposed that avatar damage should be equal to that of a DRK, or that avatar BLM spells

should equal those of a BLM. There haven't been too many actual solutions proposed on these

forums, save the thread "Possible SMN Fix"... you might wanna check that out.
Some

responses to anyone who thinks SMN is "fine as it is" ... Aerial Armor and Earthen Ward

are indeed awesome spells, and being able to offer those along with backup healing to a PT

makes SMN a valuable class up unil around the mid 40s. Then parties start to need Cure IV,

which SMNs never get, so SMNs can't cut it as a main curetank (WHM is a must) and RDM is

MUCH preferred because Refresh helps everyone with mp. Aerial Armor starts to lose it

effectiveness big time around those lvls as well, and in a good PT, no one needs blink

except the tank anyway. So for lvls 50-70, SMNs are half-assed WHMs with Earthen Ward, and

as Liquid has so eloquently pointed out time and time again, SMNs in that lvl range have a

very difficult time finding PT. That is NOT ALL RIGHT... broken class.

[Tahkisis]

Hmmm,

good point. So you think SMN's avatars should have new abilities or what? What exactlly is

yer point, you seem to have a good one. I like the point about Leviathon's Spring Water

giving more HP back aswell.

I personally don't think that taking away the MP drain

would make the job that much stronger, but it would at least give it a bit of an edge.

[Matheau]

Summoner

needs 3 things to make it a more viable class.

Less MP Drain or improved Auto-Refresh

to accomodate the vast quantities of MP used at later levels.

Avatars need improved

accuracy (you can't really buff accuracy of avatars like you could a melee).

Avatars

need improved STR, even my wyvern isn't all that helpful against ITs at my level. Since

there is no weapons equip slot on the avatars they need more proportional damage.



Honestly, it would be nice if a Summoner with a capped Summoning skill could do

about 80%ish the damage a BLM at the same level could do with the elemental spell blood

pacts, or even better make INT or MND factors in how well the Blood Pacts are or even how

strong the Summons are. The fact is the only useful stat of Summoner is MP at the moment

when you get right down to it (others are important, but mainly dealing with subjob skills

and defense).

I have seen many people pull Summoner off on its own merits up to level

40ish, but not too many past that level because it is hard to justify using them in parties

when other people are available.

[motoh]

I just

want to shoot this at this thread too, but I put it in the flamewars petition one:

If

an avatar's spell matches a BLM for damage, it still won't match it for cast time. Blood

pact cooldown is a consistent timer regardless of what you cast.

If an avatar's

damge matches a melee, it won't be able to voke, tank or weaponskill chain.

Even

with both of these capabilities, soloing wouldn't be feasible. Without weaponskills, melee

avatars'd be mincemeat for mobs solo. Without fast cast times, they'd hardly be able to

dish out enough damage to make kills easy.

BST is an odd job, and regardless of what

happens to summoner will retain it's uniqueness.

[Wickett]

Motoh

is right on all accounts... in short, SMN is so severely gimped that significantly

increasing the power of BP and melee damage would STILL not make SMN overpowered. However,

no matter how many experienced people post in these forums confirming time and again that

SMN IS A BROKEN JOB, some noob will always start a new thread saying "SMN is fine as

is," and then 10 more noobs will jump in agreeing with the initial poster... I don't know

why I even bother.

[Oceanfish]

I'm

a summoner, levelled to a reasonably high level (50 now). I have all avatars except dog (I

don't want to level my other class to 75 just to get him for my SMN).
I don't feel the

class is that out of whack. I think they need to definitely look at the % of attack

abilities they give us to support abilities, and make it so our class fits that mould,

rather than the least common denominator of our skillset.

The fact is there are

PLENTY of ways they could do it with very simple changes; without new abilities, skills, or

items. They could be more complex and drastic with items and skills and abilities though,

but this far into the game too much of that is kind of difficult to do.

The problem I

do see and agree with the original poster on is that summoners shouldn't expect other

classes' abilities to fill the void of what we lack--which is the means to use our current

skillset effectively to its mould uniquely, without making us rely on another job to sustain

our usefulness as a subjob, and without making us a class that replaces another class in a

party by rendering them useless but that makes us considerably worthwhile to have as an

addition to the party (like how bards are needed).