Summoning and Summon limits

[CyclicalImpact]

So, I've always gravitated toward classes that can summon or otherwise create pets in any rpg I play. The whole concept of whistling up a demon/elemental/undead to do my bidding or fight beside me has always felt like a quintessential part of being a sorcerer, and is otherwise just plain fucking cool. So when I started CoC2 I naturally chose the Black Mage

However, since Berwyn came along as a companion I've had a few niggling issues -

1) Summon limit. Having a limit of one summon per character makes perfect sense (If I'm playing a Black Mage, I shouldn't be able to have my elemental and one of Alrune's effigies out at once). But since there seems to be no way currently to have more than one summon split between the entire party, it seems very sub-optimal to have either Berwyn or Etheryn on my team if I'm playing as a Black Mage.
Obviously if things were changed to make it a simple '1 per character' affair then you could have a team of three people turning into 6. That seems like a pretty obvious no go. Simply upping the partwide limit to 2 could work though. There have already been parties of 5 demonstrated within the current game, both for large groups of enemies and for the player - when doing Berwyn's recruitment mission, if you have a party of 3 then Berwyn makes 4, and his summon makes five. I can't see a really good reason why I can't have Berwyn and Cait - my preferred party - and then both Berwyn and I could use our summons to make 5.

2) This is probably the bigger annoyance for me personally: Berwyn's earth elemental is so much stronger than the fire elemental for the Black mage, even after I invested heavily in Presence. Now, I have successfully played as a Black Mage while swapping out my summon for the WM's Spirit Veil, and that worked well. But doing this means my investment in Presence feels like a bit of a waste. And besides, if I'm playing as a Black Mage it's probably because I want to summon stuff.
So not only can Berwyn and I not coexist as summoners, its a strictly bad choice for me to use up my parties single summon slot.
Furthermore, even if I'm the only summoner on the party, presumably because I'm going with Brint and Cait, I have to live with the knowledge that my fire ele feels weak and IS weak compared to Berwyn's equivalent

3) In addition to the fire elemental probably needing to be stronger than it is now - an ability that it can use, like the earth ele's ground pound would be nice also - I would like some more interaction between myself and my summon. 1 or 2 Black Mage abilities that allowed for a buff - specific to the fire ele - or a dual attack, or sacrificing the ele for a big aoe. Unlike the previous two points, this is mostly just a wishful suggestion. I'll probably think up some more detailed suggestion for the Black Mage in the future, but that would be a different post if I do end up writing it down.

TLDR - Single summon limit feels clunky and limiting, fire elemental is weaker than I feel it should be - especially in contrast to other summons - and I would like some way to interact with my elemental.

Thoughts?

 

[Darkwarpalg6]

The fifth slot is reserved for guest characters, like Berwyn was in his quest. Though I'd agree some differentiations between the fire and earth elemental would be great. The former being damage and the later being a big ole tank. I'd made a 'red mage' that ties in Grease with Fire Elemental and Whitefire, and the problem wasn't necessarily the summon limit, it was that Berwyn or Etheryn would waste a turn summoning their respective pets just to be replaced by my elemental. But I figure that last point will be fixed with orders later on.

 

[The Observer]

>"I chose a companion and power loadout that dysynergises with each other, but instead of adapting my strategy and loadout I'll just lobby for the game to be made easier."

No. Single summon slot will never be lifted, both for gameplay and UI purposes.

>If you don't like a high presence build, class and stat respec is coming next patch.

>Berwyn's rock elemental is powerful because it's his signature ability. Even so, we're already looking at nerfing it.

>Fire elemental is fine where it is at this point in game progression.

>Creating a power solely dependent on your summon's presence would instantly open up a whole other can of worms, least of all would be complaints about wasting a power slot if the summon gets KOed or banished out the gate. Elaborate houses of cards are often discarded in favour of simple yet reliable powers, judging from current playerbase feedback.

 

[CyclicalImpact]

>"I chose a companion and power loadout that dysynergises with each other, but instead of adapting my strategy and loadout I'll just lobby for the game to be made easier."

No. Single summon slot will never be lifted, both for gameplay and UI purposes.

>If you don't like a high presence build, class and stat respec is coming next patch.

>Berwyn's rock elemental is powerful because it's his signature ability. Even so, we're already looking at nerfing it.

>Fire elemental is fine where it is at this point in game progression.

>Creating a power solely dependent on your summon's presence would instantly open up a whole other can of worms, least of all would be complaints about wasting a power slot if the summon gets KOed or banished out the gate. Elaborate houses of cards are often discarded in favour of simple yet reliable powers, judging from current playerbase feedback.

I feel like you're going a little out of your way to be rather superior and caustic with your response, though I admit you have provided answers to some question I or others might have asked. I was mostly voicing an opinion and looking for constructive conversation. It was not my intent to whine or complain. And at no point did I ask for anything to be made 'easier' - I have had no problem completing any part of the game so far with a variety of builds. What I was trying to say was that I personally did not find the Black Mage very satisfying to play, especially without purchasing abilities from other classes. However I understand that these sort of changes are not a priority, especially at this point in the games development. I am not lobbying for anything.

 

[CyclicalImpact]

The fifth slot is reserved for guest characters, like Berwyn was in his quest. Though I'd agree some differentiations between the fire and earth elemental would be great. The former being damage and the later being a big ole tank. I'd made a 'red mage' that ties in Grease with Fire Elemental and Whitefire, and the problem wasn't necessarily the summon limit, it was that Berwyn or Etheryn would waste a turn summoning their respective pets just to be replaced by my elemental. But I figure that last point will be fixed with orders later on.

That Red Mage idea sounds quite interesting, actually.

 

[Stemwinder]

Adding more summon slots would only compound the already-prevalent cascade problem (that a whole wave of actions occurs each turn that the player has little to no control over).

However it's not a good response or approach to just deny that there's a problem. It -is- an issue if two party members are fighting over something like a summoning slot due to the way the mechanics are implemented; it means that there's a technical problem with the way the game's set up and "bring someone else then" is not an adequate answer or a good way to endear the userbase. There are a good number of problems with the game's combat mechanics and now is the time to fix them, not later when it becomes much more of a quagmire.

If a player wants to make summoning their niche it should be possible without butting heads with Berwyn. The party-wide summoning slot could be rethought into a total party limit (in other words if you want to have two summons on the field then you can only bring one other permanent party member), Berwyn could have alternate loadouts so that he's not hogging the summoning slot or mostly-useless if he can't summon, he could have a tactics option to only summon after the PC's summon falls. Having two of the same class in the party shouldn't inherently mean there's no possibility for synergy, it means that the limitations of the system are causing friction.

 

[Savin]

So, yeah, the Summon limit is going to remain in effect for balancing reasons. Etheryn, and presumably Berry, will eventually have sets you can equip that don't have summon powers; in the meantime can also choose to equip a different Encounter power than your summon if you're so inclined. Since you're a mage, Spirit Veil (the White Mage encounter power) is a pretty good swap.

It would be cool if Berry could teach you how to summon his rockboi. I'd definitely call that a higher-level power than the basic fire elemental, since it is kind of his signature ability as a character.

Theoretically whenever Drake gets around to implementing Tactics, you'll be able to tell your summoner companions when to/not to summon -- another glaring issue in the gameplay that Tactics should hopefully fix.

 

[The Observer]

And at no point did I ask for anything to be made 'easier'

You were asking for the number of summon slots to be increased, for buffs to fire elemental, and for the player to be able to disregard good team composition. All of the above are instances of making the game easier.

Now, maybe I was a bit harsher in my words than I ought to be, and I'll apologise for that, but the truth is what it is.

It -is- an issue if two party members are fighting over something like a summoning slot due to the way the mechanics are implemented; it means that there's a technical problem with the way the game's set up

If a player wants to make summoning their niche it should be possible without butting heads with Berwyn.

Good party composition is a cornerstone of every RPG; filling roles, gaining synergies and avoiding dysynergies. There is a reason why four white mages is considered a challenge run. There is a reason why taking a party full of rogues is a losing strategy most of the time. Now, this being a porn game, most of the game's main storyline is intended to be tailored so that you can pick your companions by who you want to fuck the most and still succeed, albeit with a harder time. Optional side plots, not so much.

Berwyn could have alternate loadouts so that he's not hogging the summoning slot or mostly-useless if he can't summon, he could have a tactics option to only summon after the PC's summon falls.

We have already extensively discussed this in the background months ago, and this is not the first time players have brought up potential alterations to the party size. As the boss has pointed out, tactics and sets have been in the works for months.

Part of the frustration is that we have heard these things before, that we have discussed them, and the decision as to why things are done a certain way (like no individual control of party members) is not arbitrary; a search of the forums would have turned up discussions. Sometimes there is no flawless solution.

Even when we do give Berry a set with no summons, dollars to donuts people will complain that he should be able to summon anyway and that they don't want to use his direct damage set.

 

[CyclicalImpact]

So, yeah, the Summon limit is going to remain in effect for balancing reasons. Etheryn, and presumably Berry, will eventually have sets you can equip that don't have summon powers; in the meantime can also choose to equip a different Encounter power than your summon if you're so inclined. Since you're a mage, Spirit Veil (the White Mage encounter power) is a pretty good swap.

It would be cool if Berry could teach you how to summon his rockboi. I'd definitely call that a higher-level power than the basic fire elemental, since it is kind of his signature ability as a character.

Theoretically whenever Drake gets around to implementing Tactics, you'll be able to tell your summoner companions when to/not to summon -- another glaring issue in the gameplay that Tactics should hopefully fix.

Ah, thanks much. The ability to modify your companion's abilities seem like it would clean up most if not all of my issues.

 

[Evil]

But since there seems to be no way currently to have more than one summon split between the entire party, it seems very sub-optimal to have either Berwyn or Etheryn on my team if I'm playing as a Black Mage.

Just to point out that recently Owlcat Games found something of a gamebreaker in Pathfinder: Kingmaker; animal companions, who were effectively a seventh party member in a game designed for 6.

That's the point here. The game is meant to be balanced for a certain number of party members. If you have 4 party members, two of whom can summon, you don't have a game balanced for 4 anymore, its now skewed towards the player and there's no challenge.

 

[Stemwinder]

Good party composition is a cornerstone of every RPG; filling roles, gaining synergies and avoiding dysynergies. There is a reason why four white mages is considered a challenge run. There is a reason why taking a party full of rogues is a losing strategy most of the time. Now, this being a porn game, most of the game's main storyline is intended to be tailored so that you can pick your companions by who you want to fuck the most and still succeed, albeit with a harder time. Optional side plots, not so much.

That's not really a good example for this game since a party full of white mages would be ridiculously strong in the game as it is. Whitefire and entropic winds are two of the stronger abilities and everyone being able to heal would make the party practically invincible.

And that's not even a flaw, it makes sense that there's some synergy between common skillsets. Someone even mentioned in the topic that the summons themselves can have different niches. A tanky rock summon and an offensive fire summon would complement each other. The friction isn't being caused by the classes themselves, it's being caused by game mechanics (namely that the player and a companion are fighting over a slot and there's no way to prevent this at present).

It's all well and good to discuss the mechanics behind closed doors but player feedback shouldn't be dismissed out of hand since others can bring up issues you might not have considered internally. Like changing the summon slot limit to a total party member limit would allow two summoners to summon without stepping on each other's toes or affecting the balance (after all you're taking on more risk in only bringing yourself and Berwyn; if your summons go down they can't be replaced) and different loadouts allow the characters to have alternate playstyles that don't rely on leaving a slot vacant for an extra summon. A lot can be adjusted without affecting the balance.