I'm new to the game. The past two weeks I've been trying different builds here and there as the idea of levelling 76+ levels is a daunting one. I've settled on my melee DD (Tyrant eventually won out over SK)
Summoners intrigue me, but I'm a lil confused on the finer points..
Do you melee with them or cast?
Looking through the skill sets, Im gathering the one summon that does damage is also the one that takes 90% of exp away?
Phantom vs. Elemental. Both look great on paper (the lil girl in me is screaming for a unicorn but for practicality sake, I really need more info). PS looks to mitigate more incoming damage, but I dont see ES being more offensive. What am I missing here?
I'm hoping the Summoner veterans can give me some examples as to how they are played. What is a day in the life of your Summoner like?
Not too worried about C grade yet, but with D grade, what armor and weaps am I shooting for?
Last but not least, I don't dual box. I tend to solo a lot. Any assumption that I'll have help would be lost.
Your constructive posts would be greatly appreciated.
for Dgrade, you aint a summoner. you will be nuking, liek any other nuker around. I have heard the reuse time of summons at lvl20-40 is 2 hours. and, the summons realy s*ck at that lvl. Im leveling a warlock myseöft atm, lvl33 only yet, but im 100% nuking atm. and I will untill late 40's
As a PS or ES you are rather go mellee with your Summon.
I started to mellee with L40 because I like it more, but it is more effective to cast there until you reach L44, when your Pet starts to get better with the haste skill.
As more you grow in level as more will your spells become resisted.
ES have it more easy to cast, because the unicorn boxer has mana recharge as a skill, while the shadow of the PS has vampiric rage.
With the PS I never casted so often like with my ES, where I cast some aura bolts while I am in melee to speed it up.
The PS Summons a bit stronger later because of the servitor might spells, but you will need more attention with your mana controll to avoid downtime. But with the new herbs it is much easyer now.
The 90% Summon you asked for is mainly for PvP or only to farm.
Armor or weapon is not so essential for summoners. I tested different weapons and liked the sword shield combo and the dual sword most. But dagger and blunt works too. Claws I have not tested yet.
In the moment I wear tempered mithril set because it is cheap. My PS on Teon has Rind leather, what I wished to wear on Franz too :).
Plated Leather is an expensive option too.
Later I will buy doom light, but more because I prefer the look of it. Many say blue wolf would be better, but I think casting speed is not the point as a summone. I never died because I casted to slowly.
i would not summon consistantly till around lvl 44. that's when you get good buffs. By around 50 your nukes will be ineffective, you can still use them well into the low 6x levels but they start failing a lot the damage is paltry. Especially as a PS you would be melee centered. For solo you would use shadow who takes 30% of your xp. He has no special abilities but absorbs 15% of the damage he deals making him fantastic for solo. The 90% summon is made for PVP, she is cheap (1 D crystal forever) and as strong as shadow, the only difference is the lack of the vampiric abilities and the addition of less than desirable nuke.
Once you hit 40 you get a few abilities to help you leve. First is soulless (or merrow for ES) this is a 10% XP drain pet and it does roughly 10% more damage than shadow or silhouette (they changed the amount, it used to be about 6% more patk and some small amount more atk speed but that's been changed).
ES can solo for a while with their 10% pet but the PS one slowly drain your mp, not enough to lower it but basically halving your mp regen, Since he lacks VR you'll need to heal him a lot more which when coupled with the mp drain makes it impractical to solo. cubics are also a fantastic addition to the solo summoner making you much more capable for dangerous areas.
At 56 you get another party summon, this one is 5% drain. Nightshade, the PS summon, is a healer. The other races get buffers with pretty nifty buffs. These pets have paltry patk, mine is about the same as my actual summoner meaning he's not going to be a hunting option. However in groups these summons are awesome. The heal is about as powerful as a bishop of equal level though it's a bit slower. With good buffs though you can keep up a constant stream of heals. A PS can easly be a party healer in a pinch or, as i often do, swap pets every now and then when the real healer is getting low on mp. I can easily maintain a party for a good hour even in fairly difficult hunting areas.
I have both and ES and Warlock havent really tried PS. What appeal most to my playstyle is going a dd setup myself so I can kill even faster. I use a dagger and light armor. Many summoners stay in robes so they can heal their summon more and faster but I think its boring just to be a pet for my pet O.O
Also dont forget the ES 10% summon Unicorn Merrow get a nice aoe nuke called Hydro Screw. Its mostly used to level up on 1/2 hp mobs that you can kill fast and its fast exp and different from the normal "melee-grinding".
Summoners to me seem to the only class geared for solo play. Yes you can solo with any class more-or-less but they seem best suited to it. Rangers are good as well but you rarely get to use any of your skills since all your MP goes to firing your bow.
As with any class prior to a class change where you can go down two different paths they previous class (in this case Wizard) allows you to play like a SpellHowler/Singer and sample summoner abilities. This really does help to define what you like and hopefully make the decision of what class to play easier.
Level 20-44 seems to be a similar playstyle except that from 40-44 there is no 2 hour summoning delay where the summon does some damage and you nuke. Typically cutting 3 cast mobs to two cast mobs or allowing you to take on 2 mobs at the same time safely.
Also keep in mind any herbs you pick up affect your summon as well. I almost never have to heal my shadow currently.
Once you are beyond level 44 then you have some variety. Do you stay in robes and heal your summon while hitting for a little damage or do you go for light armor and duals max damage.
Sometime after 40 I will go with duals. I will try robe and duals since my summon should be able to maintain aggro. If that doesn't work I'll pick up light armor.
one add. never ever ever use duals as summoner, UNLESS you want cubics to fire. duals are no good for you economy. (its 2 swings / shot used, even if you miss one swing you will still use 1 shot)
well, at least this is my opinium.. I wouldent use duals unless you have masterys for them, like BDs. I did rather use a 2handed sword with summoners, or dagger. (daggers will also trigger cubics often)
I just made an ES. The class is tons of fun to play. My set up right now is light armor and a 2 hand sword. I really dont think I will have to upgrade my gear as often as other classes. Merrow has a higher p atk then me so he is my primary weapon. I normally switch off every mob which one of us tanks it. Summoner is alot of fun!
As for elemental summoners:
I recommend to nuke your way to lvl 52.
After that I used merrow for most of the PvE.
Equipment would be BW Robe + acumen weapon (homunculus is just fine) and +men, +wit, -int, and +con - str once you get enough money for it.
I prefer to grind on aoe half-hp mobs but farming AA/Blank Scrolls in catas/necros makes things alot easier(IMHO). AA are rare on the market nowadays (thanks NC ^^) you can make alot of money.
I love my summoner. I don't think that I will ever change my class again.
Disclaimer:
The information I'm passing along is based upon my own experience and environment (server, playtime, ...) and is in no way said to be the perfect way and might not be as beneficial for others as it is for me.
heh. This is the great thing about summoners.(as well as some other classes) You can set them up any way you want to.I considered duals. Then wanted to try something different. So then thought about a bow. Someone told me my accuracy might be to low to hit mobs often. Not sure hwo correct they were really. Then i settled on the idea of 2 hander. Im sure nuking would work for a while after class change. I just really dont like playing as a nuker. :p 1-40 I hated playing. Had to push myself through those levels. It was worth it.
heh. This is the great thing about summoners.(as well as some other classes) You can set them up any way you want to.I considered duals. Then wanted to try something different. So then thought about a bow. Someone told me my accuracy might be to low to hit mobs often. Not sure hwo correct they were really. Then i settled on the idea of 2 hander. Im sure nuking would work for a while after class change. I just really dont like playing as a nuker. :p 1-40 I hated playing. Had to push myself through those levels. It was worth it.
I know that feeling... got myself Mithril light (lucky - it dropped!) and an akat long bow (short on money, te he) at level 41 or 42. It wasn't bad but later on they implented a patch wich reduced the accuracy for mystic classes with bows. This was pretty bad ... >.<
I leveled to 52... rather slow - and switched into the mentioned set-up. From that point onwards it started to get extremely fast with leveling.
I had a bwla in my wh but sold it... Now I'm working on an a-grade robe set ;P
This sure isn't the common way of a summoner :) But you are right, summoners are the most flexible classes in-game ^_^
one add. never ever ever use duals as summoner, UNLESS you want cubics to fire. duals are no good for you economy. (its 2 swings / shot used, even if you miss one swing you will still use 1 shot)
well, at least this is my opinium.. I wouldent use duals unless you have masterys for them, like BDs. I did rather use a 2handed sword with summoners, or dagger. (daggers will also trigger cubics often)
2 handed swords and duals got the very same attack speed, only difference is duals hit twice, and cubic have a chance to fire TWICE. Yes for real. Most prefer daggers thoght as a shield is quite important.
Another thing to think about cubics is that they have a timer. Phantom Cubic got an 8 sec timer and not only that it have an 25% chans to get off. So this meens first time it 'cast' it cant' be cast again for 8 other seconds. And on average takes 2 hits to get fired off.
So if you ask me, it doesn't mater what type of weapon you use while you use your cubics, it's not gonna speed things up a lot.
I wonder what the timer is on Life cubic. I just picked up that skill last night and didnt seem like it went off to often. Maybe that gets better as you get higher skill levels?
i am very intersted in summoner, since i like to solo and would love to keep that ability also after 40lvl.
though as a dark wizard (26) i didn't like exping with summons (shadow od silhuette). it was much slower than nuking by myself - as i take mostly 1or2 hit mobs.
so, is it gonna change, if i will become a summoner?
btw (stupid question) - how to set up summon to attack next target and dont return to me. i found it very unplesent, when multiple mobs attack. is it possible to make summon assist me?
btw (stupid question) - how to set up summon to attack next target and dont return to me. i found it very unplesent, when multiple mobs attack. is it possible to make summon assist me?
no
about the only thing i could suggest in that situation is either target and attack the other mob quickly or use the "stay/follow" button so it doesnt run back to you
Looks like I'll give an ES a go. Thank you all for your thoughtful replies. Great community here.
Its a good class. Just playing through the wizard part can be rough. No body to mind. If you dont have a recharger(Which I didnt have) You will spend alot of time sitting. Once you pass that the class is fun. Oh and I decided on selling my 2 hand sword. The attack speed is a major downer for me. If im not smacking stuff around at a fairly quick rate I tend to get bored. Thats not saying the kills arent really fast still. Just got bored out of my mind swinging that big sword around. Now I get to think about what set up to try next.
a "handed sword does sound good to me :) I wanna help my summon, but not spend to much SS doing it. so using a "handed sword, and doing average damae with it, and still keeping my SS usage down. thats what im gonna use.
lic, from what you've just described, I don't think summoner is really the class for you. From what you described you'd be better off going from dark wizard to spellhowler, as you will still retain the ability to both solo and kill mobs quickly, which you wouldn't have as a phantom summoner, and not have to deal with all that much downtime thanks to body to mind.
If you were going from elven wizard to spellsinger, then the advice might be different, as a spellsinger has a lot of downtime which likely negates the faster per mob killing rate from their ability to kill mobs in 2 to 3 spells versus an elemental summoners slower per mob killing rate but shorter intervals of downtime (per hour).
The phantom summoner may not kill as fast as an SH with a buffbox, but I still say any class that can fully and properly solo in places like ToI and the deep end of Antharas' Lair is the better soloer. :p
Hmm I thought duals would be the way to go. I guess I'll look around for two-handers and a dagger to see what I can get a good deal on. Dual Kats do look nice tho.
A mage was perfectly capable of soloing in those places too, until NC decided to fool around with sleep. Now we can still solo(if not as well as we should be able to), but only 1X and 1/2X hp mobs (but not group mobs unless you're a sorceror).
And as far as getting parties is concerned, I'd still have to say that mages better be able to solo because I see no good reason to ever take a spellsinger, being one myself. I do however hear good things about the performance of elemental summoners in parties, though I've never had the oppurtunity to actually party with one.
And my snail mobile gets me back and forth from work at a perfectly acceptable pace, so long as I leave from home at 5 pm and leave from work at 9 am.
I'm not quite sure why you think that its ok for summoners to solo in those places and not for mages, thats a pretty large double standard, I simply hope I am not as hypocritical.
Is it OK for me to think that DAs should be able to tank DVC, but not my EE in robes? Oh noes - double standard! Mages aren't a solo class by design, summoners are.
Thats quite different and you should know it. In the latter case you are trying to usurp an intended party role for a class, when you take their role, they have no reason to be partied, but in the soloing example, my being able to solo does not diminish your classes ability to solo.
Hmm, seen a SpS around with the title 'Overhit Master'.
Oh nonono overhit = bad >_<
===
I have an ES related question. I recently (finally) made an ES, and I'm wondering, what buffs is it exactly seraphim can buff?
The phantom summoner may not kill as fast as an SH with a buffbox, but I still say any class that can fully and properly solo in places like ToI and the deep end of Antharas' Lair is the better soloer. :p
While we're on ES's, has hydroscrew being nerfed? or is it still the 1337 powerlevelling nuke of choice?
I've always been jealous of that skill ..
It's not longer the power leveling nuke of choice :( C5 changed it so that even if the summoner is out of EXP range for the party, if the summon does damage, all that exp goes to the summoner. :S
Also, in regards to the Seraphim question, Seraphim has two buffs: "Blessing of Seraphim" - increases MP regen, and "Gift of Seraphim" - decreases spell re-use time. The gift is particularly fun for PvP and raids :) Levels increase every 3 skill sets; level 1 is at 56 when you get Seraphim, level 2 is at level 62, and level 3 is at level 68. Also. Seraphim receives "Cure of Seraphim", which cures Paralyze, Root, Sleep and Stun. (I've tested and confirmed all). Of course, now that paralyze is only 30s, it's not as useful anymore :S But yeah, rawr.
It's not longer the power leveling nuke of choice :( C5 changed it so that even if the summoner is out of EXP range for the party, if the summon does damage, all that exp goes to the summoner. :S
No; if the summoner is out of range and the summon dealt damage, the XP that the summoner would have gotten had they been in range is simply gone. The summoner doesn't get it, and neither does the party.
While we're on ES's, has hydroscrew being nerfed? or is it still the 1337 powerlevelling nuke of choice?
I've always been jealous of that skill ..
It's not longer the power leveling nuke of choice :( C5 changed it so that even if the summoner is out of EXP range for the party, if the summon does damage, all that exp goes to the summoner. :S
Also, in regards to the Seraphim question, Seraphim has two buffs: "Blessing of Seraphim" - increases MP regen, and "Gift of Seraphim" - decreases spell re-use time. The gift is particularly fun for PvP and raids :) Levels increase every 3 skill sets; level 1 is at 56 when you get Seraphim, level 2 is at level 62, and level 3 is at level 68. Also. Seraphim receives "Cure of Seraphim", which cures Paralyze, Root, Sleep and Stun. (I've tested and confirmed all). Of course, now that paralyze is only 30s, it's not as useful anymore :S But yeah, rawr.
You forgot the best debuff that it cures....SILENCE. That is a huge party cure.