Stop telling SMN's what to do

[tazirai]

Re: Stop telling SMN's what to do

I'm going to have to go ahead and disagree with you that SMN in FFXI is "a glorified black mage and nothing more."
I can't say I've ever seen a BLM cast stoneskin on its party, or alter the evasion and accuracy of all their PT members or their enemy, or raise the magic attack power and resisitance of their PT members.
I'm not sure WHY people leave out the incredibly powerful SUPPORT functions SMN has at their disposal, but for some reason, they do.
And if damage dealing is the only thing you want to focus on, guess what? A SMN can do 10,000 points of damage in a fight and never pull one ounce of hate. I can't say I've ever seen a BLM do that.
To me, that makes SMN "something more" than BLM. You'll never hear me say that SMN is a more powerful damage dealer than BLM. That's just silly. BLMs are built to dole out offensive elemental based damage. That's what they were designed to do, it's their primary function, and they can dish out TONS of it.
That's not SMN's primary function. SMN *has* no specific primary function, which is why people are able to play it in such a variety of ways. That's what makes SMN different from BLM.

I cannot agree more

[thephil]

Re: Stop telling SMN's what to do

that is true the smning job is very versital.... now if only ppl whould stop using us as gimped whms

[Drive]

Re: Stop telling SMN's what to do

I'm going to have to go ahead and disagree with you that SMN in FFXI is "a glorified black mage and nothing more."
I can't say I've ever seen a BLM cast stoneskin on its party, or alter the evasion and accuracy of all their PT members or their enemy, or raise the magic attack power and resisitance of their PT members.
I'm not sure WHY people leave out the incredibly powerful SUPPORT functions SMN has at their disposal, but for some reason, they do.
And if damage dealing is the only thing you want to focus on, guess what? A SMN can do 10,000 points of damage in a fight and never pull one ounce of hate. I can't say I've ever seen a BLM do that.
To me, that makes SMN "something more" than BLM. You'll never hear me say that SMN is a more powerful damage dealer than BLM. That's just silly. BLMs are built to dole out offensive elemental based damage. That's what they were designed to do, it's their primary function, and they can dish out TONS of it.
That's not SMN's primary function. SMN *has* no specific primary function, which is why people are able to play it in such a variety of ways. That's what makes SMN different from BLM.

You didn't get what i was saying. I was comparing this current summoner and saying how it resembles the summoner from X instead of III-IX. I said using bloodpacts and only bloodpacts makes it seem more of the system used in the pre-X era but putting out less damage then a blm at the same time. But it can't be just like the X summoner because of balance issues(aeon replaced whole party). You must have read my Final Fantasy Flashback wrong and for that I am sorry.

[Grandsummoner_Kairos]

Re: Stop telling SMN's what to do

I'm sorry that we can't read need more skool

[shihaden]

Re: Stop telling SMN's what to do

Bravo!!!!!!

[Vyuru]

Re: Stop telling SMN's what to do

One thing I am curious about, what can summoners do, and I should say do reliably well, when waiting on a bloodpact timer? Sure, 1 minute isn't that long to wait between abilities, and you guys get gear to reduce the wait time, but unless you want your avatar to melee (which is fine by me) I don't see what else you guys can really do with your summons until you can use your bloodpact again. Again, this is fine by me

Sure, you have the elementals, which as I understand have a higher physical defense, dunno if that's good or not, but aren't their spells completely random? I've been told that they have as much chance as casting Fire as they do Fire III or other higher tier spells, so I was under the impression that the elementals weren't good for summoning.

Not trying to diss any summoners, this is just what I've heard, and there is alot I don't know about summoner since mine is like, level 6 or something.

Even after reading IceMage's post, I feel a little confused, but that could just be because I got 3 hours of sleep last night + a hellish commute + running all over campus.

Yay for the start of fall quarter at the UW!

[tazirai]

Re: Stop telling SMN's what to do

One thing I am curious about, what can summoners do, and I should say do reliably well, when waiting on a bloodpact timer? Sure, 1 minute isn't that long to wait between abilities, and you guys get gear to reduce the wait time, but unless you want your avatar to melee (which is fine by me) I don't see what else you guys can really do with your summons until you can use your bloodpact again. Again, this is fine by me
Sure, you have the elementals, which as I understand have a higher physical defense, dunno if that's good or not, but aren't their spells completely random? I've been told that they have as much chance as casting Fire as they do Fire III or other higher tier spells, so I was under the impression that the elementals weren't good for summoning.
Not trying to diss any summoners, this is just what I've heard, and there is alot I don't know about summoner since mine is like, level 6 or something.
Even after reading IceMage's post, I feel a little confused, but that could just be because I got 3 hours of sleep last night + a hellish commute + running all over campus.
Yay for the start of fall quarter at the UW!

read my post this page right above....

[Xylaa]

Re: Stop telling SMN's what to do

I tend to use white magic between bloodpacts, let avatar melee, pull, or (very rarely til I cap summoning magic) use spirits. Soon we'll be able to bloodpact pretty quickly, cause it takes 9 seconds to summon, the time to choose the bloodpact, 3 second wait time, then you have to dismiss. That's about 16 seconds or so, plus 9 casting next avatar makes it about 25. With two bloodpact timers, you could alternate them using 1 every 30 seconds. Now if only I had the mp of a taru lol

I've been told that they have as much chance as casting Fire as they do Fire III or other higher tier spells

Spirit spell casting is a bit random, but if they do a elemental damage spell, like fire or thunder, they always use the highest tier available to them. Also, if the enfeeble is already on the mob, they won't cast it. So there are small ways to control the spirit casting, but you need high summoning magic if not capped, and a blm or rdm to work with you keeping certain enfeebles on the mob.