I'll do my best to explain my position so people can see how I go about deciding how to play any specific job.and rank it in terms of value in a party.
Basically any choice you make in terms of strategy has a potential benefit and a potential loss and in different individual situations these can be more or less extreme and important. For example...
When I play Ninja, I have several different potential gear pieces for several slots. Let's just say Koga Chainmail versus Scorpion Harness+1. To define what it is that I pick to wear is to question what I see the job as. If I'm using boxer's mantle, Scorp, breeze rings, ext, I'm trying to be a person who has a lot of evasion. If I'm using alternative gear, I'm trying to be a person who has a lot of DD power.
Different fights lend preference to difference gear setups, and different strategies. Sometimes I'll spam ninjutsu. Sometimes I won't use at all.
I don't see Final Fantasy as a game where the emphasis is teamwork. I see the emphasis as problem solving. From the creation when you're walking around, you're constantly trying to solve problems. You're no good without a subjob, so you must get a subjob. This is not a quest, this is a problem.
People who excel in endgame are not always "team players". Quite often they are just good problem solvers. The problem is, "I want to get X piece of armor." They then chart out a process of which they can achieve it. Sometimes step 1 is: Leave my LS, join this 1 who will be more efficient at getting me this piece of armor. Teamwork is not the emphasis here.
So when I am tanking a mob that can tear me to shreds easily, that monster is the problem. Evasion gear is the solution.
And so I look at SMN, the question is, how do I get the most out of this job?
First off, to get the most out of SMN, I want SMN to be in some way unique as far as benefits are concerned. What can SMN do uniquely...? Well for several mobs endgame it can be a very effective DD. The problem is, how to get it there.
So the problem is: Leveling Summoner.
I'm not trying to define SMN as: Main healer, DD, Buffer.
I'm trying to get it to 75 the most efficient way possible.
Therefore I want to get the most amount of exp possible in the time I have available to level it.
Now where does SMN fit in in terms of an exp party? Well you'll have to examine it's abilities.
SMN/WHM.
BP every minute.
Ability of avatars to melee.
Ability to cast Cure 3 and most status affect cures.
Autorefresh.
Now as far as an exp party is concerned... you need at most, 3 jobs to = nonstop pulling. Some sort of tank, some sort of refresh and some sort of healer.
In a cannon type party, the healer can be the refresher. Sometimes no tank is even required. One thing however to consider.
Do DRKs sub WHM for exp parties?
The answer is of course no. And why? Well you can't DD and be a main healer at the same time. Why not? Well for 1 you need to rest. That means TP = bye bye. Another weaker damage by far, less utility in terms of what the DD might perform as a DD. No MP pool.. they'd be holding the party back. If they're the only healer, they'd get more efficient as the DRK starts subbing in more MP gear and uses light staff and becomes less and less of a DD. Just the same as mages melee they become less and less efficient at doing whatever they are supposed to be doing.
The problem with specialization is you can only be doing 1 thing at any 1 point in time. So usually everyone has 1 general task. "Deal damage", "heal people", "enfeeble", "buff", "tank." If I try and heal people as a BLM, my damage suffers. I have less MP to nuke. I have more hate, I can't nuke as often.
So when people say they don't want to main heal as SMN, I ask, so what do you want to do?
In the start when I came on QCDN talking about SMN, everyone was telling me how SMN were great DDs. 95% of those people who were talking with me I think had never actually partied with a SMN on FFXI. On a long drawn out post I posted all the attack BPs SMN get. Their damage, their MP cost, the dmg/mp ratio and compared it with similar BLM spells of the same levels.
SMN got thoroughly owned. I don't think most of you understand how much by. Like 1.5 dmg per mp versus 3.5 mostly. Then BLM can do cool things like drain, aspir and has no BP timer.
Even without the BP timer, SMN would still get owned. SMN would run out of MP before it could get what a BLM could do in half their MP bar.
Now let's compare to RDM or BRD, to try to consider SMN a support job.
Dispel-. Well, ok, SMN can do dispel off fenrir. This dispel takes over 10 seconds to get off firstly. Rdm or Brd do it in about a second. Next RDM and BRD can do dispel or finale and it only affects their other duties during the second they are casting it. If you use a dispel BP you are unable to use another BP for a minute.
SMN dispel is less than worthless. It'd be better to just live with whatever buff the mob has because doing the SMN BP will give more cost than benefit. It's a ruse that hurts the exp of the SMN with less strategy.
MP regen. Well that's easy. RDM and BRD have some, SMN has none.
Buffs: Well, RDM may lose out to SMN here, but then RDM can debuff the mob way better than SMN could. BRD owns SMN hard here. I am not a main brd, so I can't spit numbers at you. But BRD wins hands down. RDM debuffs the mob, BRD buffs the party. SMN does both worse. Despecialization the way to go? Do a little of both? Maybe it would work except the 1 minute BP limits you to pick 1 basically. And the debuffs are so weak you'd be better off stacking buffs.
Now healing. No surprise here, SMN gets owned again.
No cure 4. No cure 5. No raise 2. No raise 3. No regens worth casting.
Cure 3 is exping however the most used cure spell. And as far as "healing power" is concerned... my BLM, SMN, WHM, PLD...whatever, they can all cast the same "cure 3."
So the owning isn't really hard. And then... WHM is usually way overkill for a decent party. So what does SMN throw into the equation?
Well while SMN is main healing a tank that doesn't require much healing, while the WHM would sit on full MP and do jack shit, the SMN can buff the party. As well, for tanks that DO require more healing, there are many BPs that benefit reducing damage and some that increase your own party damage in the process.
So in some situations, SMN is the better main healer. In some situations, worse. However i've never been in a situation where I was unable to do it as either.
People who say that SMN doesn't get cure except for subjob forget that Ninja doesn't get provoke except for subjob. Forget what a job is supposed to do. Forget what the designers wished it to do. If you want to play a summoner as how you believe they were intended, and that means throwing avatars as the mob and melee with them and BP and throw some backup cures, then when I'm trying to solve the problem of getting whatever job I want to 75, then inviting you is not the solution. It doesn't mean I think you're an asshole, it means I want exp and you're bad at getting it.
All those SMN who are bad at getting exp are the reason mine sat so long waiting for party. When people consider inviting me they have to consider if as a SMN I am serious about getting exp. many players are not serious about getting exp. I have gotten so many invites as a DD, buffer, backup curer it makes me sick. I do the best I can, but the party is inevitably weak, because of me.
If an update shall allow me to play as that and get the best exp, then it will make me happy, because I'll get invites finally. I don't need an update to play SMN and get good exp. I want an update to get invited because people won't invite me as main healer cause so many SMN refuse to and because so many don't see the advantage of SMN healer over WHM.
People who invite my SMN as DD, or buffer or whatever they think it "should" be, are generally people not too worried about how much exp they can possibly get. Hence the parties I get usually aren't so great in terms of my own goals. People who invite me as a main healer because they couldn't find a WHM to do it on the other hand are at least thinking with the same mindset as me, and quite often we get some great exp and they gain a little respect for the SMN class, by me doing a better job main healing then they're used to with most WHM.
I don't see me as closed minded for saying SMN = Main Healer. I see people refusing to look at the numbers as closed minded for saying they want to play SMN not gimpWHM. If you want to play SMN as "guy who refuses to main heal," then what are you really except someone refusing to accept reality?
