SMN Perpetuation Cost

[Rentwokay]

In some dark and semi-retarded of the SMN community, there is a pack of Allatards that are starting to think perpetuation cost is an archaic, outdated, and unnecessary limitation placed on SMN. Regardless of the amount of perpetuation reducing equipment in the game, there's now a movement of people spamming Square-Enix with e-mails asking for perpetuation upkeep to be removed entirely.

I think it's a totally bogus request for a number of reasons. While other pet jobs don't have the upkeep associated with SMN, they also don't have the ability to pull a pet out of their ass at 30-second intervals or execute hate-free damage on the same level as SMN during the endgame levels.

The primary reasoning behind this movement is that SMNs want to be able to keep their avatars out while still being able to be the primary healer in EXP and merit parties. It doesn't matter if the avatar isn't contributing anything worthwhile or even making the situation worse. They, rather superficially, want to appease their Final Fantasy fanboy instincts and have a big scary monster that they evoked beating down the target for 5 damage a hit.

I'm just one person, and I'll admit that I'm generally against all the dumbing-down and WoW-ifying that people have been requesting. Many of the suggestions made on this forum have been very worthwhile, and Elmer is doing a great job of collaborating them.

That being said, I'm curious as to what effects perpetuation removal would have on the job in general and on job balance, soloing ability, and potential for exploits. I'd like to hear everyone's opinions on the matter.

I'm sorry for exposing you all to "Alla logic" but it seems so obvious to me that perpetuation cost is a necessary evil. I'm looking to hear some more-educated opinions, even if they're not necessarily in agreement with me.

[layoneil]

i've read it and it's retarded.

i won't deny that as an FF player, having Ifrit or w/e floats your boat tailing behind you all day is cool, but quite simply it would be overpowered and the inevitable balance nerf would suck.

SMN as it stands now is imo the best and least broken of the 4 pet jobs. any change in this direction will simply make the job more LOL worthy.

[Acturus]

i've read it and it's retarded.

i won't deny that as an FF player, having Ifrit or w/e floats your boat tailing behind you all day is cool, but quite simply it would be overpowered and the inevitable balance nerf would suck.

SMN as it stands now is imo the best and least broken of the 4 pet jobs. any change in this direction will simply make the job more LOL worthy.

Agreed.

Removing it altogether doesn't justify the Cheap Summon Cost or the relatively cheap Bloodpact cost. To maintain balance, you'd have to adjust the summon cost to 10 times what it is, and Bloodpacts would need to be easily twice their normal cost.

SMN isn't supposed to have free Avatars. From the existence of Carbuncle Mitts at the start, that's been relatively obvious.

[BRP]

I think if you should be are able to put as much effort into keeping your avatar out as a melee would his damage or accuracy. My beef with SMN is that they get stronger in such a dumb way. Base stats aside from MP are completely useless to them, and until recently, so was Skill. The fact they are getting equipment that gives unique bonuses to avatars like Levi Gloves from that Besieged NM is a good start I guess.

I think SMN needs more job abilities that help them keep avatars out. I remember someone posting something that let you sacrifice avatar TP for MP, which is pretty awesome.

From there, I think if they if they could get a trait that reduced the cost Ward and Rage BPs with MND and INT (in that order) with a straight % MP reduction based on caps like Elemental DoTs... it would give SMN a reason to use half the gear they do. Like the +5 INT on their AF hat.

If INT, MND, and CHR boosted the Attack, Magic Attack, Accuracy, Magic Accuracy, Defense, Magic Defense, and Evasion of the avatar, that would also be a good thing to do.

An idea I just posted in the suggestion thread would give SMN a PR- bonus when a party/alliance member used a weapon with an avatar name on it. Like Ifrit's Sword would give -2 and Titan's Baselard would give -3. The second tier(from Waking the Beast) are awesome weapons that become more awesome with a latent that activates only when there is a Summoner in the party. This makes for a unique game mechanic.

Some BPs are "enhancing magic" based when they should be based on the SMN's "summoning skill".

Finally, they could really, really use a [cheap] Refreshga BP, like 1/tick. Maybe replace Ramuh's Lightning Armor which isn't needed with Shiva's ice spikes and Ramuh's enthunder. If a SMN could use a Refresh that stacked with a COR's or RDM's(make it Ballad-based), it would be enough to push SMN to where it needs to be in a party setting: a support DD like COR.



Hmmm, yeah, I need to stop doing this...

[safer]

if you remove perp cost from the game, not only will the entire job be broken, but like 90% of our gear will be useless too

-perp cost items:
hq elemental staves -3
AF2 head -3 based on weather
AF2 body -3 based on day
Nashira gages -1 / Evoker's gages levi -2
Evoker's Ring -1
Conjurer's Ring -1
Evoker's Pigaches+1 -1
Auto Refresh -1

= -14 perp / -15 (for levi) under ideal conditions or -9 / -10 for levi under the non-ideal conditions (basically no weather/day effects, but this time using a refresh body piece || -10 / -11 for levi if using penance robe )

avatar perp cost is 13mp/tick at 74

why does SE have to remove it from the game, when they give us more than enough gear to do it ourselves

edit: to further elaborate... its not -perp cost thats wrong with the summoner, its everything else.. merit BP's are useless and cost too much mp , also there is still not alot a summoner can do aside from merits, to enhance its job compared to what other jobs can do to enhance themselves

[Isiolia]

It's not a major problem as I see it since a SMN is typically swapping avatars to get to various BPs anyway.

One thing I had suggested on the Alla thread was to allow for SMNs to directly call Blood Pacts as an option. Basically, be able to do /ma "Arial Armor" <me>, have Garuda pop out, do the pact, and disappear all for a set MP cost.
As a tradeoff for the speed and not using perpetuation MP, the SMN would recieve appropriate enmity for the action.

If, as they do now, the SMN called the avatar and then use the pet command for the BP, the avatar would recieve the enmity for the action.

To me, that allows a SMN in an XP/merit party to be more responsive with actions, which I see as a negative for the job now. Healing Water is great for instance, but having to wait for Leviathan to summon, wander into the right range, then use the pact kinda makes it less of a clutch move.

It would help SMNs who are focusing on pacts, but not make them able to just keep avatars out for free.

At best for perpetuation, I could see reducing the cost the longer the avatar is out. So if you did want to play it more like a pet job with a big glowy punchy thing, you could do that...but you'd have to leave avatars out long enough that you'd be limited in blood pact use.

[Khamsin]

Not that I'm a fan of letting your avatar melee, but they could even increase the melee ability of celestial avatars to parse equally against a well-geared ridill WAR or BB MNK and it still wouldn't be broken. This is because if you had an actual ridill WAR or BB MNK, they'll still be going while you're resting up the spent perpetuation. But at least you're getting something for that MP you spent leaving the avatar out.

And a real ridill WAR or BB MNK will be firing off Rampages or Asuran Fists more often than once every 45 seconds, or at least, no less than every 45-60 seconds, all without spending MP.

[aurik]

Avatars don't need healing and can have their enmity zeroed at a whim. Yes it would be broken.

[layoneil]

Avatars don't need healing and can have their enmity zeroed at a whim. Yes it would be broken.

especially in solo situations.

[Rentwokay]

Avatars don't need healing and can have their enmity zeroed at a whim. Yes it would be broken.

especially in solo situations.

If Amazon lets me gift order virgins in packs of 1000, expect a package on your doorstep within 2-3 business days.

This is exactly what I've been thinking.

[Rakshaka]

Reducing perp cost to 0 would greatly affect a summoners ability to solo, but it wouldnt have that much of an effect on a summoner in a group.

Think about summoners in groups. The most efficient use of a summoner is to use a BP (or 2), then rest while their BP timers are cooling down. In this way, a summoner can be useful to the group, and only lose a small portion of mp. If avatars became free, what should a summoner do? Should they stand there and let their avatar hit the mob? Or should they rest like they've always done, and get their mp back?

Summoners in a group won't be affected if perp cost is reduced to zero. It will still be more effective to rest in between BPs than to let the avatar melee.

The only way that no perp cost will help a smn in a group, is if they're standing and curing most of the time. If this is the case, their avatar can melee while they cure.

[Alastaire]

Reducing perp cost to 0 would greatly affect a summoners ability to solo, but it wouldnt have that much of an effect on a summoner in a group.

Think about summoners in groups. The most efficient use of a summoner is to use a BP (or 2), then rest while their BP timers are cooling down. In this way, a summoner can be useful to the group, and only lose a small portion of mp. If avatars became free, what should a summoner do? Should they stand there and let their avatar hit the mob? Or should they rest like they've always done, and get their mp back?

Summoners in a group won't be affected if perp cost is reduced to zero. It will still be more effective to rest in between BPs than to let the avatar melee.

The only way that no perp cost will help a smn in a group, is if they're standing and curing most of the time. If this is the case, their avatar can melee while they cure.

You realize that if there was no perp cost, the SMN could just rest WHILE their avatar melee'd, right?

[aru]

You realize that if there was no perp cost, the SMN could just rest WHILE their avatar melee'd, right?

why do you automatically assume that?
"you cannot heal while you have an avatar summoned." is the message i get when i attempt to rest now with a free carby out, i dont think it is related to the mp drain.

[Ksandra]

edit: to further elaborate... its not -perp cost thats wrong with the summoner, its everything else.. merit BP's are useless and cost too much mp , also there is still not alot a summoner can do aside from merits, to enhance its job compared to what other jobs can do to enhance themselves

I agree.

Of all the things that should get fixed on smn it's not the perp cost, it's a lot of other things.

I'm glad they changed skill but it could have been a little bit better. They really need to give smn more bps to play with and beef up some of the ones they have.

I always felt that levi or garuda should get a raise 2 bp that took up tons of mana (more than normal raise 2). It wouldn't "lessen whms" too much because a: on a 1 minute timer and b. should take up a lot of mp. But would still give another job with a higher raise spell. It'll never happen though. -.-;

[Alastaire]

You realize that if there was no perp cost, the SMN could just rest WHILE their avatar melee'd, right?

why do you automatically assume that?
"you cannot heal while you have an avatar summoned." is the message i get when i attempt to rest now with a free carby out, i dont think it is related to the mp drain.

Yeah, I suppose that's true.

[yrpaine]

lol wow, i'm guessing these nubs had a hard time saving up the gil for the 30k nq staves. i think the answer is to put more effort in to the job if you want avatars to cost less. sounds like a bunch of smn that got bloodpact ward/rage timers and don't know how to pace themselves. It woud be nice if they added some difficult to obtain pieces which when combined and with the right conditions lowered the cost while out (like the carb/levi gloves, af2 body/horn) but it should be difficult to reach that kind of stage as a endgame smn main, and i'm not going to write any e-mails to SE about it. That stage as smn shouldn't just be handed out to noobs cuz they're not capable of putting the right amount of effort into their jobs. I'd be really pissed if my full af2 set and evk. pigaches+1 became totally worthless for the perp cost.

[cassiraa]

You realize that if there was no perp cost, the SMN could just rest WHILE their avatar melee'd, right?

I think this is better.

Instead of free avatars, let players rest while they have a summon out, lose perpetuation but allow normal resting.

[yrpaine]

Would still be hard to balance that i think, but it would be nice to be able to /logout with an avatar out and not get pulled up at the last second.

[vegetaa]

Isn't SMN already broken enough, that people want to break it even more ?

[evilpaul]

Would lowering PerpCost by 1-3 really be that broken? Just imagine: Free Fenrir on Darksday (without weather)...I could be the envy of (triple amputee) BB MNKs everywhere.

I've got HQ staves, 4/5 AF2 (missing horn), AF+1 Feet, and it still seems a little steep at times considering the damage an avatar that's left out is doing. Poison II + Bio II is probably better DoT.