[Dev. Blog] Egi-citing News, Everyone

[Havoc Snow]

New Bayohne blog post went out showcasing some new Summoner pics!

 

July 28, 2013

Everyone, gather around.

It’s Bayohne again. You’re probably wondering why I’m whispering (by the way, I’m whispering).

 

A lot of people didn’t appreciate the tease about carbuncle details in my last post, and I promised I would make it right. Risking life and limb (and my job), I snuck onto the development server when the team was testing out summoner and their pet egi and snapped a few shots.

 

Ifrit-Egi

 

Titan-Egi

 

Garuda-Egi

 

Everyone gathered for a group photo in their fancy summoner artifact armor, all the while oblivious to me taking picture after picture.

 

 

Okay, now for why you’re really here. The hottest scoops and the leakiest of leaks!

First off, the thing you need to understand is th—Oh no... My “stealth” is wearing off… this isn’t good. I gotta get out of here!

 

/shutdown

Bayohne

[Mycroft]

While I am still a tad disappointed that the "Egis" look like they're aether caricatures of the Primals, I have to admit they look quite decent.

Especially the Garuda-Egi, the more bird-like features kinda accentuate that it represents wind.. Beyond it's green colour which is the most obvious marker.

[Havoc Snow]

While I am still a tad disappointed that the "Egis" look like they're aether caricatures of the Primals, I have to admit they look quite decent.

Especially the Garuda-Egi, the more bird-like features kinda accentuate that it represents wind.. Beyond it's green colour which is the most obvious marker.

 

Originally I was really hoping they'd be more like the FFXI Summoner in that we got to summon smaller versions of the Primals, though I understand there are a lot of people who really didn't want that. After seeing what the Egis look like I'm actually not all that disappointed by them, though I have to admit it did take me a while to get used to the idea that this is going to be what Summoners use and not their more iconic use of actual Summons.

 

What I am disappointed by however is their size, and no I wasn't really wanting anything that was colossal, just something that was at least on par with my character height. A lot of people on the beta forums were saying any bigger and they'd be a nuisance, but I have to point out that the Chocobo Companion is about 1.5x the size of your character model, which can be quite large depending on your race (Elezen or Roegadyn for example), so we already have a pet/companion in game that is quite large. If they had made Egis the same height as your character model I think they would have been PERFECT.

 

The following two images are taken from some feedback created on the beta forums, and I honestly think they hit home with what would have made this class even better. Sadly the devs said nope.

 

 

Before:

 

After:

 

Notice how big a difference this makes? The Egi looks far more fearsome and impressive while still not being so big that it would be a nuisance. That's just my opinion anyways, and in either case the Egis still look cool. Can't wait to see if we get a Ramuh, Shiva, or Leviathan Egi.

[rynshun]

I'm quite happy with how the Egis look. I personally don't think there is nothing wrong with there size, I'm just really excited to see how they fit into the party and team up system and how they will support the other jobs.

[Saefinn]

The following two images are taken from some feedback created on the beta forums, and I honestly think they hit home with what would have made this class even better. Sadly the devs said nope.

I completely agree with the feedback, sad about the response. It would have been a good place to meet in the middle. 

 

I like the appearance, I was worried about it at first, but I think they're well designed, whilst I personally would have preferred it to work like it did in FFXI (and it didn't create any problems), I am not disappointed, I just think they could be a wee bit bigger. 

 

I'm not exactly sure why SE won't make them bigger, but as much as I would like them to be bigger, I don't think it'll spoil my enjoyment, but then I'm gonna be a Scholar, not a summoner. The funny thing is in FFXI I was harping on about how Scholar should get a pet, at least after seeing Schultz using the Crimson Grimoire as a pet, it could have been a reward for doing Survival of the Wisest. Ah well, a faery will suffice.

[Havoc Snow]

The following two images are taken from some feedback created on the beta forums, and I honestly think they hit home with what would have made this class even better. Sadly the devs said nope.

I completely agree with the feedback, sad about the response. It would have been a good place to meet in the middle. 

 

I like the appearance, I was worried about it at first, but I think they're well designed, whilst I personally would have preferred it to work like it did in FFXI (and it didn't create any problems), I am not disappointed, I just think they could be a wee bit bigger. 

 

I'm not exactly sure why SE won't make them bigger, but as much as I would like them to be bigger, I don't think it'll spoil my enjoyment, but then I'm gonna be a Scholar, not a summoner. The funny thing is in FFXI I was harping on about how Scholar should get a pet, at least after seeing Schultz using the Crimson Grimoire as a pet, it could have been a reward for doing Survival of the Wisest. Ah well, a faery will suffice.

 

The response Hvinire gave didn't really explain much, just that at one point the Egis were actually a little larger than they are now but the design team decided to make them smaller. On the plus side of things, changing the size of the Egis doesn't really require a lot of work, so I'm holding out hope that maybe they'll reconsider it post launch.

 

As far as appearance goes, and the lore behind what they are, I think the Summons are pretty awesome. They look close enough to the original Primals they are based on while maintaining their own unique appearance, so I'm happy with things on that end. My biggest issue and the one thing I'll have a very hard time learning to live with is just that the most well known, iconic class in Final Fantasy (and I say this because EVERY game has Summons in it, and thus to some degree Summoners) uses Summons that are no bigger than the vanity pets we have.

 

I still plan to main Arcanist/Summoner, so if they don't change it I'll learn to live with it eventually... I just don't have to like it!

[allgivenover]

I really enjoy the direction they've taken Summoner for XIV. I always disliked how we were flat out summoning copies of the primals in XI, and this way it will prevent people from RPing that they are summoning the actual primal instead of its essence.

[Jonexe]

The following two images are taken from some feedback created on the beta forums, and I honestly think they hit home with what would have made this class even better. Sadly the devs said nope.

I completely agree with the feedback, sad about the response. It would have been a good place to meet in the middle. 

 

I like the appearance, I was worried about it at first, but I think they're well designed, whilst I personally would have preferred it to work like it did in FFXI (and it didn't create any problems), I am not disappointed, I just think they could be a wee bit bigger. 

 

I'm not exactly sure why SE won't make them bigger, but as much as I would like them to be bigger, I don't think it'll spoil my enjoyment, but then I'm gonna be a Scholar, not a summoner. The funny thing is in FFXI I was harping on about how Scholar should get a pet, at least after seeing Schultz using the Crimson Grimoire as a pet, it could have been a reward for doing Survival of the Wisest. Ah well, a faery will suffice.

 

The response Hvinire gave didn't really explain much, just that at one point the Egis were actually a little larger than they are now but the design team decided to make them smaller. On the plus side of things, changing the size of the Egis doesn't really require a lot of work, so I'm holding out hope that maybe they'll reconsider it post launch.

 

As far as appearance goes, and the lore behind what they are, I think the Summons are pretty awesome. They look close enough to the original Primals they are based on while maintaining their own unique appearance, so I'm happy with things on that end. My biggest issue and the one thing I'll have a very hard time learning to live with is just that the most well known, iconic class in Final Fantasy (and I say this because EVERY game has Summons in it, and thus to some degree Summoners) uses Summons that are no bigger than the vanity pets we have.

 

I still plan to main Arcanist/Summoner, so if they don't change it I'll learn to live with it eventually... I just don't have to like it!

 

I'm okay with smaller summons, honestly. Nothing aggravates me more than having to see other people's stuff clogging up my screen simply "because." With some of the smaller dungeon hall ways, I could see large summons getting really annoying.

 

It would be cool if they had some kind of... release mechanism or something. You use the small Egi to build up some kind of energy (or a long cooldown?); then use an ability to unleash a more powerful (bigger, more primal looking?) version of it for a limited time.

 

Also, no way in hell Summoner is more iconic than White Mage, Black Mage, or Warrior/Knight. Summons didn't even exist until FFIII, unless you count the added (way later) content in FFII <<

[Havoc Snow]

I'm okay with smaller summons, honestly. Nothing aggravates me more than having to see other people's stuff clogging up my screen simply "because." With some of the smaller dungeon hall ways, I could see large summons getting really annoying.

 

It would be cool if they had some kind of... release mechanism or something. You use the small Egi to build up some kind of energy (or a long cooldown?); then use an ability to unleash a more powerful (bigger, more primal looking?) version of it for a limited time.

 

Also, no way in hell Summoner is more iconic than White Mage, Black Mage, or Warrior/Knight. Summons didn't even exist until FFIII, unless you count the added (way later) content in FFII <<

 

Well one thing to keep in mind, as illustrated by the images I posed, is that what most people are asking for is not a drastic change, and really won't have any impact on visual clutter compared to what you already have from all the incredibly flashy weapon skills and spell effects. The changes that were being requested would have no more effect than an extra party member in the group, so the only way this would be cumbersome would be if you had more than one Summoner in the party, and even then only if it were a 4 (or possibly 8) man group.

 

In larger raids that involve 16 and 24 players it no longer matters, and in fact it might actually be detrimental to have the Summons this small because it'll be that much harder to pick them out of a large group of people grouped up around an enemy. With that many people in a group you can't really see what's going on anymore to begin with, it's pretty much just a mass cluster of being mashing keys and trying to stay alive, following some semblance of strategy when they see key triggers going off during the fight (like the effigy in the Ifrit fight).

 

In FFXI there were complaints about Summon size which could make sense because in that game they were huge, some of them were like twice the size of the character and often floated above ground which made them appear even larger. What people are asking for here is effectively just make the Egis the same size as a Midlander Male, this allows them to still be within an acceptable size while making them appear more impressive and easier to keep track of in the middle of a fight.

 

Not to make a comparison to WoW, but the image I posted above makes the Egi around the same size as the Voidwalker or the Felguard pets for the Warlock, or even the Warlock while using Metamorphosis, and no one ever complained about them being too in the way.

[Hyrist]

I happen to be fine with the sizes they are currently. Seeing them more up close now, I'm not exactly for the enlargement. As someone who has to fluctuate around the enemy frequently, I do not want to have to worry about my vision obstructed by something large and floating around. 

 

The request for larger size just reminds me constantly of Yoda. "Judge me by my size, do you?" Comes to the forefront of my mind and it's all that's where it begins and ends. 

 

It feels like a confidence issue, and there's really no way to separate it away in this case. 

 

The truth of the matter is, beyond the initial impression all I'm really going to be caring about is my performance, not how flashy my character works. I don't want to be unwanted because visuals were prioritized over performances, or that I'm avoided because my summon seems more obtuse to the melee/tank in the thick of the fight.

 

So that's where my priorities lie with the Egis right now. I like their design, and care more about their impact in the fight to the size they have. I'd rather them the size they are now, functional and non-interfering, then increase their size and have them become cumbersome.

[Desmond Aryll]

I think that Egi's appearances change. Whether they "level up" and get bigger over time or they increase in size when in battle is up in the air. Notice we have only seen them very sparingly and not doing much either.

[Havoc Snow]

I'd rather them the size they are now, functional and non-interfering, then increase their size and have them become cumbersome.

 

See this is an excuse a lot of people use that just isn't the case. It's falsified speculation that just because they're larger than they are now they'd be obstructing peoples views or getting in the way of their DPS or whatever. How would them being the same size as a Hyur be any different than if there was a character standing there instead? It would be the difference of a Lalafell standing next to you turning into a Hyur, does that make things suddenly harder for you to play your class? You can't even use the excuse of visual effects because they're no more flashy than any class spamming weapon skills or spells. The only person that could be affected by the increased size would be a Cat with ADHD that is easily distracted by shiny things.

 

As far as as it being a confidence thing? Mm, maybe. For me though it's less about confidence and more about expectations. Summoner isn't a class you start the game with, it's a class you don't even gain access to until you're close to end game. Summons are the equivalent of endgame pets, and in every other game I've played the pet class always started something small (like Carbuncle) and once they reach end game they usually had something large and impressive. Examples being the Felguard in WoW, the Thrall of Wrath in TERA, pretty much every Elemental the Spiritmaster could use endgame in Aion, all of the Summons in FFXI, I could go on.

 

There's nothing wrong with Carbuncle at all, but for creatures that represent HUGE Primals, even as a sliver of their power I'd expect something much larger than what we have, and for them being end game pets they're very unimpressive as far as size goes. As I said earlier, they're the same size as Minions are, and I honestly don't want to be able to compare the size of my Ifrit pet to my Cherry Bomb Minion.

 

tldr; Increasing Egi size doesn't hurt anything, this is misleading and inaccurate. Making them the same size as a player character wold go a long way to making them look more impressive but wouldn't detriment players ability to work around them in a fight.

[Jonexe]

I'd rather them the size they are now, functional and non-interfering, then increase their size and have them become cumbersome.

 

snip

 

tldr; Increasing Egi size doesn't hurt anything, this is misleading and inaccurate. Making them the same size as a player character wold go a long way to making them look more impressive but wouldn't detriment players ability to work around them in a fight.

 

I'd venture to say this is entirely subjective. I don't like a mass of large pets around me when I'm in melee, especially tanking. They add to the clutter, doubly so when positional mechanics come into play. This held true in WoW and other games as well, for me.

[lady2beetle]

I think I'm in the "like the size they are" camp. I understand what you mean about them only being the same size as a hyur, but the problem is that they are flying, so they are actually taller. That would cause a disruption in large battles, I fear.

[Havoc Snow]

I'd venture to say this is entirely subjective. I don't like a mass of large pets around me when I'm in melee, especially tanking. They add to the clutter, doubly so when positional mechanics come into play. This held true in WoW and other games as well, for me.

 

Can you name one situation though where you'll actually be surrounded by a "mass" of pets? Even in 26 man raids I don't imagine most groups will be comprised of more than a few Summoners, and even then points don't matter in the visual scheme of things. (see below)

 

I think I'm in the "like the size they are" camp. I understand what you mean about them only being the same size as a hyur, but the problem is that they are flying, so they are actually taller. That would cause a disruption in large battles, I fear.

 

I can't speak completely for FFXIV since I never got to take part in endgame in 1.0, and even then it might be very different in 2.0. However I have years of experience in raiding in numerous games, as well as a lot of PvP experience, and I can say without hesitation that in large battes (meaning fights that involve multiple full parties) everything sort of devolves into a cluster no matter if the pets are Lalafell sized or Adamantoise sized. There are going to be so many other players standing on top of you, and you're going to be moving around so much it will be INCREDIBLY difficult for you to really focus on just your character. This is why in many games raid enemies are often disproportionately large. Lets look are some fights from WoW since it's the best example for raiding that I can really come up with. When you fight for example the Lich King he is HUGE, way bigger than any of the party members, but when you actually see him in the cutscene he's about half the size as he was in the fight (marginally bigger than a normal PC). This is because it's much easier to determine character position as well as discerning enemy location among a massive group all stacking on top of it.

 

Final Fantasy tends to do this as well in the sense that every boss I can think of tends to be very large, even in the four man dungeons. So again, increased pet size being detrimental to gameplay is just an urban legend. The ONLY way they could be cumbersome would be if they made them so big that you had a hard time actually seeing the enemy, but if you look at the example I gave above that wouldn't be the case.

[Hyrist]

 

tldr; Increasing Egi size doesn't hurt anything, this is misleading and inaccurate. Making them the same size as a player character wold go a long way to making them look more impressive but wouldn't detriment players ability to work around them in a fight.

 

Stating this as a claim of fact is inaccurate, I can attest to this personally as it is is my own personal preference that these do become a matter of obstruction while I am playing another class. I can affirm this preference of mine both in FFXI and Aion, having my camera obscured by a rather large creature (Be it Shiva's or Garuda's Posterior or the rather large higher grade elemental from Aion.) I found myself having to stop and re-position my camera on more than a few occasions for each game.

 

But as someone has said, this impression is subjective. You prefer them larger, and they do not bother you. That is fine. It is your recommendation to make for the developers and if they decide to go with it, it will simply be something I will have to abide by. But I've listed my concerns as an individual and I'll stand by them. A personal opinion isn't something that needs to be discredited for the sake of advancing one's own agenda. If the sizes get larger and are in my way as a Dragoon I will deal with it. 

 

However, as a Summoner, if they are enlarged I will be self-conscious of the change, rather than enjoying of it, as I know how I would feel in the melee position. Granted, this is me inferring someone else feelings - but the uneasiness will be there regardless. If it becomes too obtuse it may very well shy me away from the class entirely.

[Havoc Snow]

 

 

 

I'm just going to repost this image again, because I feel it says everything I'm trying to say. People still seem to be under the impression that "larger" means "huge" and that's just not the case. No one is asking for Egis that are the same size as the Summons from FFXI (those were admittedly quite large), and definitely not asking for anything as large as the elementals from Aion, I merely used them as an example of what I was accustomed to in most games. Sadly the picture uses a point where the Egi is floating quite high off the ground, but in the latest tour of eorzea video we see Titan actually floats only just a few inches off the ground putting him roughly at about the same height as a Lalafel, so increasing their size by the suggested amount in the above picture would put them on par, if not a little smaller, than a Midlander.

 

Perhaps I'm getting a bit too defensive over my own opinion here, so allow me to apologize. Where I'm coming from however is, whether or not they change the size of the Egi, this is the class I want to play the most. I absolutely adore pet classes, every MMO I've ever played it's always the class I flock to the quickest. Eight years of WoW I made one character, a Warlock, and I never played another character my entire career in that game. When I joined TERA my first character (and the first I leveled to 60) was a Mystic, in Warhammer Online I played a Magus (thought they weren't much of a pet class).

 

For me the Egis ARE the class in a lot of ways, they are going to be what is iconic about the Summoner class more than the Grimoire ever will be. So my reasoning for wanting larger Egis is perhaps the exact opposite of why people DON'T want them. I want to be able to see my pets in the middle of a fight, and my fear is that in a large raid my pet is going to get lost in the mass like a small child in a crowded mall.

 

I don't want to press X to Jason.

[Saefinn]

I think if the avatars are the same size as a normal Hyur and the Summoner is standing away as a summoner would, I don't think there would be much of a difference than say if a Dragoon Roegadyn was standing in your way meleeing the enemy. In FFXI, the avatars were larger than players and took up more room than the suggested adjustment. Whilst it didn't bother me, in fact I liked it, but I accept it was not the same for everybody.

 

I think the proposal is a fair compromise. It's an increase in size, without the sacrifice to people's line of sight, at least that would be my argument.

 

[edit]

Or as Ash just said.

[Azthran]

I can see things from both sides here, I've played the pet classes in other games aswell as Melee and I've had my share of things getting in my way be it other players or a pet that has some pathing issues. I think some of the concern here is not so much that the summon is on top of you but has positioned itself in front of your camera because of poor pathing or what have you.

 

Also keep in mind that if you make them taller you also have to make them wider, and while we have Roes running around they also aren't full of glowy particle effects. Some of these effects can be turned off mind you as I'm pretty sure I remember an option to turn off weapon/spell effects that were not my own. So even if you make them a bit taller like that you are still adding to the volume of them and I'd be willing to bet that some of them might end up being wider than a Roe and glowing.

 

Again it's not much different than having a player get in your way. Also as mentioned summoners only harness a sliver of the primal's power and from a lore point of view this may just be as much of that power as a summoner can handle without risk of losing control.

[Havoc Snow]

Again it's not much different than having a player get in your way. Also as mentioned summoners only harness a sliver of the primal's power and from a lore point of view this may just be as much of that power as a summoner can handle without risk of losing control.

 

I could agree to the lore point of view of them being small because it's all we could handle, but that's just trying to use hand wavery to explain a design team decision that had nothing to do with lore. Hvirine stated that they were larger at one point, but for one reason or another they made them smaller without any insight into why they were made smaller. Maybe it was for the reasons expressed here about line of sight or something, though I honestly just don't see the line of sight thing being that big a deal if the increases being suggested in the feedback forums.

 

I will say this though, if they create a decent pet interface I'll be able to live with the tiny Egis, but from what I've seen from the Chocobo Companion my hopes are not very high. I'm kind of assuming that a lot of what the Summoner will do is healing, buffing, and micro managing their pet while casting debuffs or dots on enemies, and if a lot of that requires me to actually have line of sight on my pet, then I'm sorry but that's more important than a larger pet making you have to adjust your camera angle.

 

I will correct myself however, I watched the videos that showed some of the Egis in them and they do actually float a bit higher than I had originally thought (about as high as shown in the images), however with that in mind size doesn't really matter, they'll block your line of sight no matter what.

[Hyrist]

I understand the request, even the fact that you feel that it may be some sort of compromise or reasonable request to ask for a pet that is, essentially, equal in size of the player.

 

But perhaps, and this may be bad expression on my part and I am sorry for it, what is not being relayed here is that with the existence of your pet, you've essentially doubled the size of your own avatar.

 

Also, keep in mind, the picture being used for reference is not, in the least bit, accounting for perspective change in the video. The Ifrit is actually closer to 2/3rds the size of the Hume Male, rather than half which is being inferred here.

 

Likewise, the enlarge picture used as refrence is actually closer to the red version implied rather than the green, which is actually more accurate to the real avatar.

 

To display how the camrea angle and distance is skewing the view of the players, we must first reanalyze the appearance of Ifrit Egi during its introduction.

 

 

 

In the video, from 0:58, to 1:03 you can pause it at brief intervals in which the angle the Egi can seem much larger to much smaller depending on the angle of view and the position it is.

 

So let's get another reference.

 

First, the picture of each race of Summoners, as listed in the Blog. (View from the front for additional reference. )

 

Then, let's take a screencap of the

, which directly overlays the Size of the Titan Egi to a Roe. (at 4:53 you can verify that even with the Roe in front, Titan is still roughly half its size.)

 

Comparing a Roe to a Hyur in the previous transposed images, you get roughly 2/3rds the size of the Hyur - which, in my viewpoint, is a fair size for the Egi's to be.

 

All and all I'm satisfied with this size reference. I do not feel as if summons need to be as large as its casters.

[Azthran]

 

I'm kind of assuming that a lot of what the Summoner will do is healing, buffing, and micro managing their pet while casting debuffs or dots on enemies, and if a lot of that requires me to actually have line of sight on my pet, then I'm sorry but that's more important than a larger pet making you have to adjust your camera angle.

 

I know they were used as healers a lot in FFXI though with the focus on DoTs and debuffs I have a feeling summoners in ARR may be a bit more like Warlocks from WoW. With that being said it's just my opinion from what I know about the class and we will all find out in phase 4. (Unless I have missed something along the way and it's very likely as I haven't been keeping up with summoner and such.) As for needing line of sight of your pet or to target them to pull of some abilities. Well it may be something we need to consider but I doubt that will be the case but just like saying that you need the pet to be bigger so you can pick it out in a crowd is kind of a poor excuse for a couple of reasons. 

 

1) As stated they do seem to float quite high off the ground. (Granted this may not be the case for all of them though.)

 

2) If you can't pick them out because of all the weapon/spell effects going of then go into your settings turn some of them off.

 

3) The summons have a pretty distinct look to them so couple that with turning off effects from other players should make them easier to spot.

 

4) Multiple summoners due to a large group for a raid/FATE or still having trouble after turning off effects from other players? You can easily make a macro to target the Egi.

 

I understand that a larger pet could make things easier to pick them out yes and please understand that steps can be taken on both sides for various reasons. You could turn spell effects off to better find your Egi while I could turn them off so there isn't another glowing thing in my face.

 

I'll I'm saying is that the road goes both ways that steps that the melee can take to avoid the Egi being annoying can also be applied to help the summoner keep track of their Egi.

[Havoc Snow]

While I have to say I agree with most of what Azthran said, I still can't help but argue that the Egis could benefit from a size increase. As Hyrist said, the Egis appear to be about 2/3rds the size of the Hyur Summoner shown in the original video, so if thats the case would added an extra 1/3rd to their size really be that game breaking for melee classes?

 

On the topic of pet control however I sincerely hope they add a separate interface for controlling Carbuncle or your Egis. It seems almost useless if they have to take up a party member slot like the Chocobo companion does, and if I have to manually click on my pet in order to casts heals on them or something I'm gonna be disappointed, not to mention that the actually method for micromanaging the chocobo (changing stances and what not) was pretty bad, especially given you had to make a whole separate action bar for it if you wanted to switch stances regularly like I did.

[Azthran]

I honestly don't think it would be game breaking for the reasons I've already mentioned. At the end of the day though it's the dev's choice and who knows maybe summoners will get some sort of ability on a long cool down that buffs up the Egi and makes them larger for a bit similar to Beastial Wrath from wow OR maybe something similar to Astral Flow from FFXI but they take on the full primal form to unleash their ability.

[Havoc Snow]

maybe something similar to Astral Flow from FFXI but they take on the full primal form to unleash their ability.

 

I doubt they'll have this since we're already going to have the ability to summon Primals in their full form later on down the line (not Summoners specifically). Which makes me wonder, if making Egis just a little larger than they are now is such a hinderance to some, how will they feel having the full scale Ifrit or Garuda taking up their frame of view?