I'm thinking to start a new character, and i'd like it to be a summoner - Phantom or Elemental. So i'd like to ask an advice from those who played them - what are these characters strengths/weaknesses compared to each other? What good are they overall on PVE/PVP?
Ps is principally a melee summoner. Due to now recharging pet we are mroe prone to meleeing next to the pet and tanking. As with all summoners we can solo literally non stop starting at about lvl 44. Our main solo pet has a passive VR which compensates for us not being able to regen our mp like an ES or warlock.
In C4 we got a new group pet that allows us to basically be a healer, a good one too. it also has a nasty hate/debuff that works in PVP as well as PVE
Our group DD pet is called soulless, he's one of my favorites if only for the reason that i get invited to archer parties if i use him. He has an MP drain and no VR so unless you have an SE with you he's not very good for solo. he's a low XP summon though so it's alright.
PVP, ahh the great fun you can have as a PS. Your principal PVP summon is silhouette, she's not terribly powerful or anything but at 1 D crystals you can spit them out like a DAOC theurgist.
In single PVP i almost always kill my target, now the thing to remember is that i'm often dead too depending on their class. If you have a shield then daggers aren't a problem, archers arent' too bad either. Silhouette's life drain suffers from her horrible matk but on low mdef target it can do wonders. Probably the best advice i can give you is stay alive, if you loe your CP immediately battle heal yourself and pop CP pots. Don't worry about dealing damage that's what your pet's for. Also due to our high mdef and robes low pdef we can actually do an ok job killing mages though i'm not going to pretend that i can gank a necro or anythign like that, but a SH maybe.
For group PVP you may consider pulling out a different pet. nightshade's AOE hate can wreak havoc on the unsuspecting enemy, and if you'r a summoner they usually are. Soulless has a kind a lame AOE poison but his run speed over 200 coupled with 10% more patck than silhouette make him great at archers, Shadow, i will be honest i don't like using him at all in PVP. He just doesn't get in enough hits to justify the cost.
One of the great things is that if you're a pansy you can sit back with the healers and whatnot and just pick targets for your pet. Since this doesn't allow you to support your pet i'd recommend only doing this with silhouette.
Downsides.
Out of the 10% summons soulless is the worst one, his constant mp drain means that our most powerful summon is unusable in solo.
Nightshade is great, but the equivalent summons for other races do BD/SWS buffs rather than healing. This is conditional but usually people want buffs more.
No empower means that for silhouette to be really strong you need an SE. Not a big deal at her cost but still.
All summoners are versitile if you ask an equal level summoner (good luck finding mroe than 10) they could easily have a completely differnt setup. Most likely theirs works just as well or sometimes better. PS i think is the least versitile however. Because of our pets we have less freedom to change. Not to say that we arne't versitile but i don't think we have the bredth of the other classes.
The ES is a transitional summoner-- they start off nuking and then switch to melee eventually. This gives them the edge in leveling pre-52, but makes them slightly slower at leveling than the PS post-52.
One strength is that when nuking, the ES is the cheapest class to play. They can justify wearing any C grade light or robe armor and can use almost any mage weapon effectively, even mid-D grade before level 45. I had a 2x dbsps consumption weapon from level 40-46 and had a net gain of 100a or so adena for every mob I killed. Then, at level 45, I switch to a C grade Soulfire Dirk (2x cbsps consumption weapon with Magic Root), which still saved me some good cash rather than using a Homu.
Another core strength of the ES is their C3 10% summon-- Unicorn Merrow is unarguably the best PvE summon among the PS/Warlock/ES 10% summons. Using beast bsps and beast ss, it makes it makes both an effective AOE summon and a soloing one. Unicorn Merrow and Soulless are the only constructions in C4 that have magic AOE attacks which weren't changed when C4 came-- they can still hit 20+ mobs with one spell.
The C4 summon, available at level 56, is mostly a PvP grouping summon. Its spells include 2 buffs which last about as long as a BD's buff does-- one that increases the speed of a skill reuse, the other which improves mana regeneration. This summon does not help in PvE as much as ESes would like it to, although it certianly gives an effective skill speed boost for nukers/daggers/melee DDs. (The Warlock has unarguably the best C4 PvE summon-- its buffs turns melee classes into gods)
As Physics mentioned before, the PvP summon's advantage is that they are extremely cheap. Although some claim that the ES has the PvP summon advantage due to its the Servitor Empower spell available to them, I do not think that the spell is useful enough to help in PvP situations when a PS could easily just get an SE to do Empower for them.
The main PvE summon, the Unicorn Boxer, is something that is still discussed among C4 summoners with a love-hate relationship. Its main advantage is its ability to recharge its master, and therefore, if Servitor Recharge and Master Recharge are used together effectively, the summoner can never run out of mana (because of Higher Mana Gain). Its disadvantage is its horrible 30% exp penalty-- slower leveling indeed, versus no downtime. Most meleeing ESes do not use it, preferring to melee along with Merrow, who is unable to recharge and has different stats but has a smaller exp penalty. Melee summoners, in general, don't use their mana except when buffing or healing.
Downsides--
Although I do not know what summon PSes use 52 to solo with, the Shadow has a clear advantage over the Boxer-- with beast SS, it rarely needs to be healed. Also, the servitor Might gives the PS a slight advantage in PvE as well.
The C4 summon is extremely noticeable (Unicorn Merrow is bright blue and looks like a stream of water), making it an easy target in most PvP situations-- in the first round of a siege, my Merrow has never been attacked because people cannot tell which side it is on. The next time it dies before even finishing its first spell.
The PS has the edge when it comes to the C4 summon's PvP effectiveness-- the PvP aggression spell and healing abilities are matched by none.
There are a bunch of them on this forum, gonna try and pull one in here-- although what I can tell you, the Warlock stands the middle ground of the three summoners :D
The ES nowadays ideally starts as a healer and stays such till the day he croaks. Unless he's grouping - or filthy rich. :)
The warlock play is a mix of both - basically you would level with Kai out (he does a bit more damage than the other servitors when he tanks, as he has the damage reflect special that makes his low PDef a good thing), and then dump him and recharge with Kat as needed.
ohh in regards to solo with shadow. He is basically the only pet i can solo with for good XP. With beast shots he basically doesn't ever need healed, even if he's tanking. i'm currently soloing BS with no problems, often not even botheriung with cubics.
If you have a friend who'll give you and shadow VR then it becomes disgusting. The VR's stack making him all but unkillable. Downside is that we can't really solo with soulless. His MP drain and lack of VR make it so that it's just ridiculous to try and heal him. If you can duo with a SE on the other hand he becomes fantastic, his higher patk and faster attack keep him going just fine.
I have curiosities about warlocks. They are rare on my server because most humans, with pet handling aspirations, are going necro to be good at pvp.
I don't like the looks of their first pve cat. (Kat) The first pvp cat is cool enough,(Mew) but there is this new cat that is tight . . . (looking up name) . . . . . Kai is tough looking. I would like to hear more about him (it has to be a Tom cat)
I have a ES, and while I don't know enough to advise; I do know that Boxer is nothing but an MP battery now. Nuking ES's summon him, recharge mania, then switch back to merrow.
I now have my 48 ES set up for melee, but I would rather nuke. (may change him back, PL set sells easy enough) I wish ES would get mild nuke increases, so they could efficiently assist the pet with nukes all the way up. I don't mean anything like the nukers get, but just something to keep them like they are in their 40s. (I knoe, they got enough love in C4)
I should be posting a PvE video of my ES levelling healer style soon - no nuke, hardly any melee assist. It's pretty darned good EXP.
Kai has no attack specials, but he gets a Reflect Damage shield - as an ES, you know how much damage summons take, so throwing 20% of that back isn't bad for damage output.
Ruple here is the best setup, I was just in the situation you were in, and I have switched 4 or 5 times between melee and nuking :D
Get a demon set and a Soulfire Dirk. Put whatever SA you want on it, although it might be wise to choose Mana Up. Also get a +4 Int -4 Men tattoo if you want. Regardless, get someone to Empower you, or go to the racetrack, or get L2 Day scrolls, do whatever possible to get Empower. Then go nuke at the DV, trying to use Solar Spark as much as possible. Lots and lots of exp+++. The secret to nuking with the ES after 45 is to go nuking all the way. The reason I chose the Soulfire Dirk over something top C is that it has 2 cbsps consumption, making it cheaper to buy and maintain. Overenchant it for all I care :D
Then nuke. Without the summon. When your mana gets low, summon the boxer and nuke with it a bit so that it is recharging your mana and you are still killing at the same time. No downtime is essential. Then when your mana gets full, unsummon it and continue.
For me I never use my summon in PvE. I have no good buffs no VR skill.
corptted man has a vamp claw, but it don't do much for regen.
how ever in PvP, cursed man all of the way, nothing compares to the dmg it does. (Beast SS) he can solo take out people higher lvl then my self. he has two skills one is a mortal blow type skill the other is a stun type skill. (hes a beast)
his down falls is low m df., high SS consomtion, (it's like 3).
skills don't all ways land (specailly the mortal blow), and I'm not sure that his atk speed is high. his run speed is high tho.
my other one is a joke, hits hard (good for raids) but sucks other wise. no skills, low P df. low m df. low hp to.
warlocks are true middle of the road. we can nuke, or we can melee, just depends. I'm a pure melee summoner, because I like it that way :) .
I've got two basic choices meleeing. I can melee with Kai, spamming css and beast ss all they way. doing this, I can level up helluva fast (about 6% to 7% every 20 minutes at level 47), but I also go broke helluva fast too, to the tune of 20k to 50k adena loss per 20 minutes. (note: I HAVE to spam css with Kai out. no choice, w/o css Kai steals agro from me no matter what in about 1 swing, and he simply does not have the pdef or hitpoints to take a pounding, and I don't have the mana to conually heal him). Kai hits hard (like 20% more pattk than Kat), but is rather fragile, damage shield notwithstanding.
my other choice is to level slightly slower with Kat. at 30% exp drain, and no css for me, my exp falls to about 4% every 20 minutes. Kat is a lot tougher than Kai, so even though I lose agro quickly,Kat can take more of a beating. plus, he regens my mp if I do need to do a lot of healing. I can actually solo in a cata or nec (green mobs only) with Kat, which is near impossible with Kai. while Kat lacks pattk, he is a bit more durable than Kai, with almost twice Kai's hps and a little more pdef. (though you'll often hear me curse Kat's slow run speed. waddle FASTER, **** you. :) )
Mew is my 90% summon. she is my PvP summon, mostly (though I occasinally use Kai when having to chase down archers. 200+ run speed ftw and all that), and she doesn't do too badly. beast bsps and I'll stand her up out of the way somewhere raining windstrikes on someone. I also use her as a "travelling" summon. if I'm not in town, I have her behind me if I'm not actively leveling. nothing worse than being agro'd without a cat out, or being jumped by a PK'er. there is simply no time to summon a cat at that point, and a summoner w/o his summon is toast. Mew also stands behind me while I fish. she is very handy about keeping caught mobs from eating me, and there is no delay while I equip a weapon. at only 1 d crystal per summon, she is very cheap and handy to have around to guard my back when I'm out and about. she doesn't have Kai's pattk, nor does she have Kat's durability, so she isn't quite as useful in actually leveling (90% exp drain notwithstanding)
I think one of nicest things about being a Warlock is that you still have corplse life drain from your dark wizard days. this means you are, to a degree, self healing. my common stategy is to hit a mob twice before I turn my cat loose on it. usually, this will hold agro on me until my cat hits 3 times (1 or 2 from Kai if I'm not spamming ss), and by the 5th or 6th hit, the mob is dead. CLD brings me back up to full hps, and repeat on the next mob. I'll have to actually heal my summon every 5th mob this way, less if I'm hunting greens mobs (almost never, actually).
At 49 I'm nuking at the DV with a Demon Set and Soulfire Dirk. Every time before I grind I get Empower and hopefully Zerk from the Racetrack, and I'm able to two-shot without my summon. I summon the boxer and he recharges as I am nuking, so I never have any true "downtime." Then when my mana is full I unsummon him and get right back to 2-shotting mobs.
If I can't get Empower, then I nuke with the boxer. The exp is slower but the killspeed actually doesn't change much-- and I can get more exp from my overhits if I let the summon deal as much damage as possible before the mob dies.
I make 10% at 49 with a full buffround without the summon (I make sure to run out of mana just as I lose Empower, so that I don't waste any of Empower's usefulness). Then I summon the Boxer-- As it recharges me and attacks mobs, my mana slowly goes up again. If I somehow get someone to Empower (there are almost more buffbots than actual players in the DV) again, I unsummon the boxer and the process starts all over again. Exp+++++
At 49 I'm nuking at the DV with a Demon Set and Soulfire Dirk. Every time before I grind I get Empower and hopefully Zerk from the Racetrack, and I'm able to two-shot without my summon. I summon the boxer and he recharges as I am nuking, so I never have any true "downtime." Then when my mana is full I unsummon him and get right back to 2-shotting mobs.
Hmm, I don't get it. Enlighten me guys, when you guys say you're nuking, what exactly do you mean? Do you guys still nuke with your sub 40 nukes?
At 49 I'm nuking at the DV with a Demon Set and Soulfire Dirk. Every time before I grind I get Empower and hopefully Zerk from the Racetrack, and I'm able to two-shot without my summon. I summon the boxer and he recharges as I am nuking, so I never have any true "downtime." Then when my mana is full I unsummon him and get right back to 2-shotting mobs.
Hmm, I don't get it. Enlighten me guys, when you guys say you're nuking, what exactly do you mean? Do you guys still nuke with your sub 40 nukes?
You ever see an SE solo? They use windstrike ..
Believe me, your sub 40 nukes will last ya until about 50 or so
Or just go melee and Light and get more XP/hr because you never have to worry about mana anymore. My clan has 4 ES', 1 PS and a Warlock. I already was melee, two other ES' (in the 45-55 range) were magic users in C3. They both switched to melee a little while into C4 and both saw their XP rate increase dramatically.
Do not underestimate the damage a Focus SA kris dagger or Focus SA SLS does in those levels. Sitting on your behind certainly works, but is far from the best XP rate you can receive for your toon. Especially at lower levels the damage you can add to your pony is worthwhile. As an extra bonus you have increased Pdef from the light and always close to max mana with your Merrow. Leaves you mana left for a pvp situation or multiple adds. Casting the boxer for battery reasons works, but I don't see the point of using extra D crystals for an inferior way of levelling.
Of course its a total different case if you decided to nuke because you think melee is lame / less fun. I still find that a bit odd though; we did not receive 40+ nukes for a reason, our pony does. Once your 65/70+ theres no other option as dropping the nuking anyways. I have a 144 matk weapon and even with emp and zerk I can't damage the mobs my lvl, even if I wanted to. Borderline levels (windstriking at 30, nuking at 50) works, but its not efficient. Classes seems to balance a bit out after 60+ in C4. In C1 a 5x was regarded "highlvl", but with XP rewards being so high lately you can consider anything below 60 a transitional phase / borderline level anyways. Maybe you feel insulted by this, but if you simply look at the time thats needed to get to 60 you will notice its the same which was needed to get to 40 or so in Prelude. Basing strategy for a class on something that can be done in 2 weeks just seems odd to me. I rather read about strategy that will work for the next year to come.
Besides the better XP/hr rate with melee you can also go Light armor, which further increases your survivability. Robes do *NOT* increase your mana-regen, as some people think. The reason one goes for robes is either a) Slight increase of castspeed or b) more mana buffer because your a manaspender (healers, nukers). (or c) - you dont have Light masteries :p ). Melees do not run out of mana, removing a) and b). As a bonus your grindrate increases. As a nuker summoner you however may need to get used to it, as was the case with my two lowlvl ES clannies. Once they found the correct balance they are making levels at an impressive speed.