The 6th Ministry's Secret: A Summoner's Guide (v2)

It is BiS for Magic BP and Flaming Crush I believe

Hi.

I have a quick question about avatars.

Ive been doing SMN strat in ambuscade. But one thing is annoying me is somehow when Kikoku pops, my mules avatar go straight to him without it taking any action or me sending anything.

Is that a bug or is there something im not aware of?

Thanks in advance

any time your character specifically gets hate your avatar rushes to defend you and attacks the mob.

Iirc, Avatars usually chase after things that aggros you. In ambuscade, its party wide hate so when something pops, avatars can be going chasing after it. I'm afraid you have to keep an eye for it is all.

it's not just party wide hate. there's some weird bug with whoever has either done the last action or whoever has done the most actions before claim / initial aggro gets the mob's attention at start. I don't know the exact details.

I feel like there was an Ambuscade a while back where this was fleshed out a bit more. The qiqirns maybe, or lamia? It was one where you had to separate 3 or 4 mobs.

Anyway, I think the prevailing theory was that actions taken before the pull generated like 1 VE or CE which took effect on the pull. So whoever performed the most actions before pull would have initial hate on them all. It was usually the COR or WHM, but sometimes SMN could be high enough on the list for their avatar to go chasing things, especially if they'd done a couple of wards with different avatars. So most groups would just say "don't do anything when we enter, until after they're pulled apart."

It's definitely a weird mechanic, though.

Yeah I was under the understanding that it's not a bug but just a weird rule in that zone that everyone is on the hate list on entry, just they wait for you to aggro before it applies.

I think was also the case in Legion if I recall correctly and has to do with how they worked out taking multiple alliances.

So appearently I happened to get my hands on a Cath Palug Crown that I wasn't planning to get.
Should I use it and on which BPs, given my gear?

Atm I only have 2 pieces of the Apogee+1 set (head and feet), meaning I would lose 4% BP damage and not 2% like you would with 3+ pieces of the set.
Basically for me it's:

Accuracy+35, Att+25, Mab+25, BP+12

vs

Acc+38, Racc+38, Macc+38, Mab+38, BP+10


I think it probably wins for magic-based BPs, not sure for Flaming Crush and for Physical BPs.
Help me out please!

Pretty sure Cait Sith crown is BiS for Flaming Crush, not sure about anything else though.

Given my gear, Cath Palug would be:

-2 BP, -25 Attack, +13 Mab, +38 Macc, +3 Acc.

Do the + overcome the -? When you need macc, maybe, but when you don't?

get apogee legs for flaming crush?

So I used this page as reference:
https://www.ffxiah.com/forum/topic/53593/a-summoners-gear-guide-2019

I no longer play SMN so I can't remember values of BP to Mab and whatnot.

Edit:
Also refer to top of Page 128, Patb mentions it as well.

Well with another piece of Apogee+1 there's no question about it, Cath Palug wins, period.

But it's specifically for my situation that I'm a bit confused.


@Frod
Yeah, eventually they will come, they're in my "To-Do" list and already have the Abj.
But atm I don't and I need to decide what to with the crown do for the time being.

If you lose 2BP and gain 13 Mab it's a win, 1 BP=2,5 Mab.
So more Acc and Macc and +8Mab over Apogee crown. The lose Atk is as is sadly but rolls & bubbles counter that.
Also sounds like you use Path :C should change that to A or B depending.

I use path C for inventory saving. It's not the best for either magical or physical, but it's nice enough for both.

Of course if I start using Cath Palug Crown for Magical and Flaming Crush, I will swap my head to the Physical path and use that for physical BPs in place of the Crown.

Why are you thinking you lose 2 BP with Cath Palug?

Apogee Crown +1 with set bonus active is 10. Cath crown is 10. Cath is across the board superior, for both Flaming and for pure magic BPs like the merit BPs. I literally don't have a path A Apogee Crown anymore, I changed it to path D for idle.

And I'll spare you my usual rant about path C being worthless, even before Cath Palug existed.

Nope.
Set bonus is 4% for the first 2 pieces, then 2% for each additional piece past that.
I only own 2 Apogee+1 pieces: Head and Feet.
If I remove the head I'm not gonna lose 2% but 4%.
See what I mean now?


No don't spare me please I'm curious! I'd love to hear your point of view on the topic.

I can just give my view on it, Path :A Mab will favor Flaming Crush more then the extra Atk on B or C.
And for Feet Physical, While Path: B with extra Atk is nice, you mainly want them for set bonus. Roll's, Bubbles & Food will be your atk buffs mostly. And Path:A is really nice for Flaming Crush.
So Path: A will be a better goto route until/if you got inv space.

Ah I see what you're saying now. No dalm? I mean I suppose I can see the logic, it's not THAT much better than the AF body, although what do you idle in?

Ah ok I just figured I'd given you the rant before since I've done it multiple times now and lost track of who I give it to lol

Basically my perspective on it is that even if you only want one set, consider the opportunity cost when compared with path A. You give up 10 MAB on Flaming Crush and magical pacts, and gain 25 attack on physical pacts. Numbers-wise it seems like a good trade, but MAB is a multiplier and physical attack is not. In my opinion, you'll get a lot more mileage out of 10 more MAB on magic/hybrid pacts than you will out of 25 more attack on physical pacts.

Of course, YMMV. If you never use magic pacts and only use Flaming Crush once in a blue moon, then every rule has its exception.

Edit: I played with the numbers a bit. With an avatar having 2200 physical attack which is easy to hit in Escha, a gain of 50 attack is an increase of 2.3%. If I plug my magic BP set into my calculator and remove 10 MAB from head and feet, it's a loss of 3.7% overall damage. So less of a difference than I imagined, with uncapped attack. I still think the point stands, though.

I idle in Perfect Witching Robe. Doesn't have the negative stuff of Apogee if I happen to get hit by some random and unexpected AoE.
Last but not least, inventory +1 because I already own it and use it on other jobs xD
If I were to get another HQ Apogee piece (and I definitely am, eventually) that's Legs btw, definitely not body.

Thanks for the rest of the info you shared btw, apreciated it.

Yeah and outside of Escha that 2,3% would probably be a bit higher. 2,5? Definitely not higher than 3.0%
Your point still stands but in the end it still doesn't seem like a bad compromise for someone who want to play it cheap, no?

For legs, if you were to get a single HQ piece, what path would you get?
Because I was looking at D. For magic BPs I already have Enticer's (which atm I use for everything lol), so Apogee+1 legs path D should be a pretty big upgrade for physical stuff like Volt Strike and, given the huge increase of additional BP, it might be a small upgrade over Enticer's even for Flaming Crush?
...of course it depends on the balance of Mab/BPD I have in the other slots, but in general I think Path D should be slightly better than Enticer's for Flaming Crush.

I'm just waiting a couple more months. If no timeline about reforged Empy gets released, I will probably give up and get Apogee+1 legs.


Not really in a hurry anyway, sadly I rarely get a chance to use SMN, wish there were more but I'm mostly bound on other jobs.

Yeah that makes sense on the Witching Robe if you're able to use it on other jobs too. Inventory problems are real, especially these days.

Eh cheap doesn't really have anything to do with it, my point was that even if you only get 1 pair and not 2, I still believe it should be path A. But I concede it's a pretty insignificant point to squabble over. :)

Yup absolutely path D, no question or debate. They're amazing for Volt Strike / Pred Claws.

Path A is the other useful path, and it's basically tied with Enticer's Pants on magic pacts (sometimes winning, sometimes losing, never by more than a few hundred damage). So ultimately path A is mostly a Flaming Crush piece, and even for that, it's barely better than path D. Definitely don't use Enticers for Flaming Crush. TP Bonus just gives accuracy on Flaming, no damage increase like it does for magic BPs, so the path D slacks would be a nice step up for your Flaming set.

Hi.

Quick question.

Supose youre reading to start a burn a the mob cast a sleepga on your pets.

Is there any counter measure against this aside releasing and resummoning avatar?

Maybe some kind of self inflicting poison on pets?

Thanks in advance

Not that im aware of. Escha/Reisen has Pet temp healingitems. Outside of that dont think so.
It's one of the downsides of a powerfull ability, strong weaknesses,
Pet with Paper defense low HP and easy to sleep/stun/amnesia.

Dawn mulsums maybe?

There is definitely a neck item you can equip.


edit: Sacrifice torque.

edit again: This wakes the SMN, not the pet. My bad.

That neck wakes up the summoner, not the pet. I think?

Yep that's my bad.

Have you guys discussed "Varar Ring +1" vs "Cath Palug Ring" for stuff like Volt Strike? And generally multi-hit Blood Pacts with TP-carry properties.