I posted this on L2Pets, but thought I might get more replies here...
So after playing two of the nuker classes (Sorc - SH) I'm looking at starting a Summoner. I seem to solo more then anything and I don't like dual-boxing.
Since I like both Humans and DEs I'm thinking about Warlock or Phantom Summoner. I've already read a lot about both and they both seem to have positives and negatives.
Things that will help make my decision is the armor. Yes, I guess I'm shallow. Since I'll be looking at this toon for hours/months/years I like to have armor that appeals to me.
I also think that I would prefer to melee right along with my summon then just sitting back and casting, but I keep hearing that casting speed is important for healing the pet. So right there I don't know how to balance things. Don't you need to melee to activate the cubics?
I don't like BWL or DC robes on DE's. I do like all the A Light armor and Tallum, NM and Maj Robes.
Humans look good in most of the recommended armor: BWL and DC, but not Tallum Robe.
I already own Demon, Karmian and Avadon robe sets. I doubt I could afford DC robes on Lionna.
So with this information what would you guys recommend?
I'm thinking:
PS -> C Demon -> B Avadon Robe -> A Light or Tallum Robe
WK -> C Demon -> B Avadon Robe or BWL if I can get it -> A DC Robe (unlikely).
If those work then the Warlock would cost me more in the end. I just don't know if that works for a melee Warlock or PS. I know that casting speed is important too so I'm a bit undecided and unsure how to plan this as you can see.
Warlock, IMO. I played one, a long time ago. One of the most fun classes I've tried.
You get Queen of Cat which helps you get PvE groups and is usually wanted in PvP groups, too.
Demon set is good until B-grade, you can probably nuke your way up there. After that I went with BW Light. Daggers for weapons, get in an melee with the cat.
Arcane Disruption, Binding Cubic, Cat Queen, Kai the Cat
Warlock > all Summoners.
Warlock will level faster than the others due to Cat Queen's delicious buff, also.
Warlock + SE = DD + PP + Bishop + SE in two toons.
I wouldn't wanna level any toon without a boxxed buffer in this game, though. Have fun soloing in a C Grade Cata/Necro in B Grade, etc. etc.
I'm slowly leveling up an alt to become a Warlock. It's 33 now but I'm so tired of Human Mystics/Wizards that I'm about ready to delete him and roll an Elemental Summoner. Tired looking at basically the same toon no matter which one I'm logged in on :(
Elemental Summoners are ****.
Cats and Unicorns are cute. PS summons are the ugliest things ever.
Well, for what it's worth. I'll give my experience as a fairly fresh Phantom Summoner.
I exp this way, if I can keep doing that, I can't tell you.
I use soulless summon. Only eats 10% exp, hits like a mack truck and its fast (movement).
Windshackle the mob to keep aggro and I basically tank the mob while the soulless is my DD side kick.
Mob dies, I use my corpse leech to gain some hp (if needed) on to next one. I have yet to sit down and regen any mana or hp, I rarely have to heal the pet since im tanking. You can summon cubics if you like, but note that spark cubic (stun) is 5 d-crystals. Very expensive for a stun.
Im playing Female Dark elf in theca set, think that light armor looks awesome on those. Male is ugly tho.
The summons themselves look absolutely awesome. Silloute is maybe the less cool. But soulless is rawr!
I really love my PS so far. Its a none stop grind toon for sure.
You could go for cloth armor and acumen, then you will most likely want to use the shadow summon and kill x2 hp mobs. Eats more experience but the shadow is a very nice tank.
Rolling a warlock was never a factor for me. Hate the cats, the look of humans, the sound of humans and.. what's left? hehe
40-46/48 you'll want nuker robes, then when you switch to using your summon you'll want some light armour at first because your p.def will be better than your summon's.
At 52 you can easilly switch to robes because your summon will steal the aggro really quickly and at 56 it steals the aggro in 1 attack even when you hit the mob first.
For PvP, you'll definitely want some light armour though, because anyone in robes is way too squishy against an archer.
But the biggest thing I'd put into consideration is the "then what". You can level up a PS to 80, but then what? You'll be good in olympiad (as good as warlock), you'll be ok in PvP/Sieges (although they'll put you in misc groups along with tanks, so be happy if you get mediocre at best buffs) and same for raids.
If you go warlock, starting at 56 you get feline queen which gives a buff that pretty much everyone will want in PvP, raids and parties. That means you'll easilly fit in with the "elite cov archer" party, so you'll have CoV, dances, songs, etc. With all those, you can get yourself a drac bow eventually and start firing off those cubics at a distance, because you'll have a ton of +acc buffs on ya (guidance+dance+cov) and with songs+dances+queen buff+wc buffs your damage with a drac bow will be pretty decent.
People will be glad to have a 56+ warlock in their party/clan/alliance, while most will be indifferent to the PS unless they can consistantly provide 1k rep points by becoming hero often enough. But then again they'd just as much appreciate a useless olympiad class who has little or no olympiad competitors.
Dont roll a character based on what ever buff they might have. You stated that you solo (like to?) alot. Then there is no reason to based your choice on what the summoner can give parties. A class is only as good and fun as you play it.
Too many players roll X because of a buff and or ability that they think will make leveling, playing and what not so much more easy. While it may do so, they constantly whine that the class is boring etc.. Pick your class what feels right to you, not on what people can get from you in exchange for exp.
In terms of playstyle and what not, PS and warlock are basically the same thing. If someone really enjoys one and hates the other, that's really silly.
But like I said: THEN WHAT !? Someone may like soloing, but someday, most probably they'll want to get involved in sieges, pvp or raids. And once they do, they'll be wishing they had made a warlock instead of a PS. It's the difference between "Please come on your warlock, we got a spot for you" and "You can come on your PS if you really want to, whatever".
In terms of playstyle and what not, PS and warlock are basically the same thing. If someone really enjoys one and hates the other, that's really silly.
But like I said: THEN WHAT !? Someone may like soloing, but someday, most probably they'll want to get involved in sieges, pvp or raids. And once they do, they'll be wishing they had made a warlock instead of a PS. It's the difference between "Please come on your warlock, we got a spot for you" and "You can come on your PS if you really want to, whatever".
QFT.
And I'd actually do an Ele Summoner before a PS. Warlock and ES get some very useful abilities 56+. One has a very nice DD buff, the other can cure Silence, etc. (only class that can do so). PS get, a heal.
In the end...
Servitors get targetted quickly in Seiges (group/multigroup) PvP anyways. I think my servitor lasted about 5 seconds last time.
Warlocks have no negatives compared to other Summoners, IMO.
Look, i've been playing MMO's for atleast 8 years. And time and time again I see people rolling a class because it has "something useful". And the spend most of their time whining over their choice and the choices they didnt make. Every class has something usefull and a player who enjoys the class can see and hopefully share with the players around him. MMO's are dominated by steotipical views. Every summoner has something for a party and a player who enjoys his class has even more to offer a party.
The above poster says he solo's alot. So warlock and Phantom summoner are excellent choices either way. If he was into raids, seiges and so on. He would already have atleast a decent clan to group with.
I have a very good clan, but I enjoy being in control and solo'ing. I love chit chatting with my clan mates tho and helping when I can. This could be what he is looking for and then in the end, he should go for what ever suits him the best race and appearance wise. Not on what ever skill you get that allows to sit like some bot in archer group wasting your 12bucks a month on squat. Which exactly why I ditched my Bladedancer which was in prolly the best alliance on the NA servers. Dance, dance, 1s break, dance.. what a way to play a game.
Thanks for all the replies, though few were about armor. :P
Trensharo: I actually have a boxed buffer, but I was hoping to save a little money and concentrate on one character. I feel a bit more accomplished if I can do it without the boxed buffer.
Sigge / Katastrophe / Trensharo: I've actually taken both sides into account and I do have friends that have been playing for years and all of them are in the 60+ area. While I've been playing off and on since beta. So I tend to solo a lot since most of the low level zones are empty. I actually don't mind the solitude, don't have to watch your back so much. I also typically like the summoner classes anyway. Why it took me this long to finally decide to make one is beyond me. Maybe it was all the recent nerfs.
The Warlock does seem to be the most balanced choice. The option to be useful in parties is actually a nice plus. Though I'm a bit concerned that I'll be forced to just sit and buff every two mins as I'm sure my melee is too worthless to be up in the front. That's kinda boring, but I don't have to group if I don't want to.
If I can actually manage to get the armor and afford the crystals then there's little to worry about. But like I said all I have is robes up to Avadon. BWL doesn't seem THAT expensive but DC robes is crazy on Lionna. Though I suppose I shouldn't worry about something that could be years off or even never happen considering my L2 history of coming and going. :P
With cubics you do not have to hit the mob, your summons does this just fine,wind shackle them if ya like, but focus on healing your pet.You get summon buffs like shield,might,haste2,magic barrier,emp these work great, just finding the sb's will mean hunting for them. Some drop in catas/necros and some from the elders in EG. Get an acumen weapon,wear robes in c grade and do areas where pots drop or green cata/necro mobs an you will do fine.
The PS gets a little bit more than just a heal. Just ask any party that's had it's colective butts saved when they got hit by over spawn and......
The PS has Nightsade cast mass curse drawing the aggro to itself.....
PS UD's nightshade and heals him up and continues casting mass curse, continuing to hold aggro while.....
everyone gets the chance to heal up and fight or run away....
I know. I've done this on my PS.
and about that heal. It's not just a heal. It's a really nice heal!
Fully buffed at lvl 56 my Nightshade heals for 793HP and can heal a lot! I've been the healer for pole parties. Nightshade cast 3 heals and I can heal him twice and have him almost full HP again. Did I mention that his heal is a sacrifice? He already has a lot of hp, so if you give him BTB and HP regen it's even better. Plus if he does run out of HP, I can un-summon him and summon a new one that is full HP. Course he needs to get buffed real fast for full effect
My point is, played properly, the PS can be just as bad *** as the other 2 summoner can. As for soloing? Try using Shadow instead. I know that he takes 30% which will slow you down a bit, but he has built in VR so you will not have to heal him as much.
Summoners can also be great if you want to farm an area for a while with the manor system. Use the 90% summons (which is way cheaper to run, uses D crystal) and you won't out level the area any time soon.
I just subbed a Warlock.
Its much much more fun than my nuker. I can solo very efficiently( well I got an OOP SE with me with vr3 soon to be 4 ) , they boost me so I can get faster the cat dnc , and when I do get it I will be able to fit in every physical damage party.
I think its an amazing char :)