[Snake]

Not to mention that Magic Gunner's damage has been sharply dropped. They can't do their usual 250 damage with 60 SKI and 40 GUI anymore. One of the 'counters' to Summoner, which was Interference Shell Lead Storm, is no longer viable.

[Nanovelich]

Yes, most can be destroyed in a single turn, but even the squishy ones boast 500 HP, which the Summoner himself isn't receiving because of the greater threat on the field, of which two can be summoned in one turn.

Unless you have, like most classes do, AoE of any sort. Then you just hit them and most if not all of their Youkai to completely obliterate them, because the Youkai probably won't survive even that.

Not to mention that Magic Gunner's damage has been sharply dropped. They can't do their usual 250 damage with 60 SKI and 40 GUI anymore. One of the 'counters' to Summoner, which was Interference Shell Lead Storm, is no longer viable.

Using something that clearly needs to be fixed in and of itself as justification for why something else is broken is not a valid argument. Magic Gunner's damage has dropped right now but will likely be (or at least should be, in my opinion) brought back up in the future, so it's not fair to use its current state as justification for anything else being too powerful, even if it is the most absurdly overpowered thing in the game right now.


And wait- Hold the phone.

even the squishy ones boast 500 HP

But this is just wrong. Absolutely wrong. The 'tankier' (like Terrasque) boast roughly 500 HP, and the squishier (like Izabe) boast about 230 HP. The only Youkai that seems squishy while boasting 500 HP is Asrai, and that's just because she's a Water-based Fairy, therefore loaded with VIT. The reason why their HP is like this, I explain later.

Unless you're just looking at DEF/RES for 'squishiness,' as a majority of Youkai have their DEF or RES in the lower 10's. And they also come with their own unique weaknesses, not that anyone needs to exploit them to kill them off 99% of the time.

Also, got Silence? Hoho, fuck a large majority of Youkai entirely. Throw that on a Spell-using Youkai and watch it be reduced to a worthless potato sack, since it sure isn't curing its own Silence or hitting anyone with Attack. Oh, it's luck-based inflicition? Well, with Youkais' wonky stats, it's most likely going to inflict anyway.

Or, in some cases, just position yourself with the wisdom of a thousand builds. By that, I mean move out of their attack range if you know it, because a lot of Youkai are slow shits, and once you're out of range, they have to stick their neck out for you to chop off to get even close to being able to attack again.

...Lastly, as much as I don't want to point it out because I don't think it should even exist as a point, things like Adversity Annihilator exist, specifically made to be Anti-Summoner or Anti-Youkai. (Summoner aside, equipment like this is just bad, in my honest opinion. All it does is support counter-building and metagaming. That's another story though.)

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Anyway, I think Youkai's damage output needs to be drastically lowered, but their ability to survive on the field needs to be boosted. It's really ridiculous that Summoners have it better to just reap the benefits of Sync-Mind without ever risking their Youkai than it is for them to do what their namesake entails. This game of Hit-and-Run with Fast Offense game changers and Summon Storm position'd sniper Youkai is just wrong.

Even playing a Bonder with Shared Pain with a single Bonded Youkai for maximum stat benefits to it, chosen specifically for its relative potential to survive, you'll be hard-fucking-pressed to not see it die in under 3 turns with just how squishy they are anyway. All it takes is knowing whether it's DEF or RES that particular Youkai is extremely lacking in to dunk it hard.


As it is, Youkai only get HP from VIT and SAN because of how their stats are set up. (So again, you'll hardly ever see a Youkai with over 500 HP unless they're packing VIT for Water reasons or are just meant to be tankier, likely lacking in other fields for the sake of it.) They don't get the inherent extra 210 at level 60 that a player character gets from allocating 210 points. I don't entirely believe they should get this system, because they get a lot more than 210 points allocated, but they need something to compensate for a majority of them running around with some combination of usually 3 or more of the following:

A) Under 15 DEF (Before Summoner bonuses)
B) Under 15 RES (Before Summoner bonuses)
C) Under 25 VIT (Before Summoner bonuses)
D) Major Elemental Weakness(es)
E) Miscellaneous Weaknesses (Drowned Woman being treated as Possessed, shout out to Holy memes, is a good example)

The numbers are, of course, based on level 60 Youkai.

It's also less of a point with how Basic Attacks got their knees knocked out, but Youkai are Crit-magnets as well. If you can't Crit the FAI-packed Summoner to process your Fleur and such, aim for his Youkai for instant Momentum, or your bugged extra damage to Basic Attacks back.

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As much as I don't think simply nerfing their damage output will end complaints of people being hit by burst-damage-glass-cannon Youkai as it is with Summoner strategies, I support the changes proposed by Spoops, if only to put Summoner in line for the time being.
Emphasized for TL;DR, if nothing else is read. Wrote too much here and reiterated a lot. Time to do it some more.

A majority of complaints with Summoner is how they pull off these 'clever' timings to drop Youkai in order to get their hits in before those Youkai are inevitably fucked up, and thus people get hit suddenly slammed with anywhere up to 500 damage by each Youkai. It guarantees they'll get absurd hits in because that's the point: That's all the Youkai's good for. It's most likely going to die, very quickly, so unless you abuse specific things to get its attacks in, it's kind of silly to waste your momentum (and living Youkai for Sync-Mind) on. That's why you get these two gripes all the time: "If I didn't abuse Turn Order, my Youkai would just die (or get Silenced) before it got to do anything!" and "If its damage wasn't so high, it wouldn't be worth bothering with."

This combination of:
A) Extremely high burst damage
B) Specific 'window of attack' timing, when you can't do anything to react or are stuck between stopping said threat(s) and attacking the Summoner himself

is what makes Summoners so frustrating to combat. Rather than simply throwing a few sandbags over point (A) and calling it a day, I'd be happy to see someone propose a method for getting rid of point (B) as well. Keep in mind, Fast Offense is just part of the picture, a side-effect of the general strategy now.

If you want to make Summoner less aggravating to fight while likely appealing to a lot of old-fashioned Summoner players who didn't simply hop on the meta train, make Youkai more reliable to use in general and cut out the reliance on this 'brief window burst damage' strategy that's centered entirely on abusing how Turn Order works.

And no, ye who value otherwise, don't say, "But that's just using good strategy with your Youkai!" Actually having your Youkai on the field and managing their position and placement along with your own is strategy. Managing when to summon them and when to unsummon them is strategy, and there's a large handful of completely unused Skills that are meant for this. A knockback on Summon that is never used in order to keep opponents in range. An explosion on Unsummon that's never used because it's better to just attack until the Youkai inevitably dies than waste that 3 Momentum. Passive regen for Youkai in your Contracts who aren't dead, but who the fuck would bother with that when you have to manually Unsummon for that to be viable and there's an Invocation that also revives?

On the other hand, dropping your Youkai to blast your opponent in the face as much as possible because you know the Youkai is dead meat as soon as it gets hit, all before that opponent gets a turn to act, is just being annoying. Dropping Summon Storm and then gangbanging your opponent with the help of specifically built Max FP and FP Regen is just barbaric and cheap.

"Okay, smart ass. How do we address point (B) then?" You got me. I've got nothing specific to propose for that. Hence why I support the straight nerf for now.

[Raigen.Convict]

Spoops initial idea is supported by myself as well. At the least fast offense won't tripple turn with the youkai placed just after the summoner. Thinking on this if this skill was turned into a toggle that would eliminate the 7 m double tap that is so heavily abused as well. It would be better for strategic use as once the summoners turn was done then the youkai can act. Then once the next round starts the game checks if fast offense is toggled on and if yes it places youkai AFTER the summoner.

High cel summoners can use their slower youkai without as much fear of instagibb and slower summoners still get their youkai to act on the summoned round.

[Neus]

Fast Offensive actually got nerfed a little in this update, changed to 50 FP and 2 round duration, but maybe I should have hit it in the Momentum given instead (something like 3 at cap, so you have to get closer to place them better and they can only get off one attack).

I don't mind toning down the elemental ATK scaling a bit, but I don't know if I want to make it that low and have SWP. If you think they're versatile attackers now, they'll be even more so if they have access to a reliable source of power (IE; SWP) for all the youkai skills.

[MegaBlues]

50 FP makes that skill ridiculously expensive for doing anything other than PvP OHKOs, especially with a duration of only two rounds. I can't imagine it being used for anything else other than a slow Bonder/Tact. They would just go last, Fast Offense and Summon, then use On My Mark to move before the enemy, double summon, and win.

I would change Fast Offense to a toggle. While active, bonded Youkai gain 4M on the turn they're summoned, but the summoning cost (but not maintenance) is doubled. If the user only has one Bonded youkai, it gains another 4M and the extra cost is negated. Then lower it down to the usual 2 SP for toggle skills, one to learn and another to not take up a skill slot.

[Neus]

Making it a passive skill probably not gonna happen. Removes the ability to disrupt it, the activation cost, and the SP investment for no real purpose.

[Chaos]

Fast Offensive actually got nerfed a little in this update, changed to 50 FP and 2 round duration, but maybe I should have hit it in the Momentum given instead (something like 3 at cap, so you have to get closer to place them better and they can only get off one attack).

I don't mind toning down the elemental ATK scaling a bit, but I don't know if I want to make it that low and have SWP. If you think they're versatile attackers now, they'll be even more so if they have access to a reliable source of power (IE; SWP) for all the youkai skills.

I almost want to suggest making Fast Offense only last one round, so people will have to continuously burn FP to put down one rushed-out Youkai each round.

The change makes Elemental ATK stacking less effective, which helps against people who only stack up defensive stats. I think a higher baseline is worth the lowered ceiling.

[Slydria]

I feel like something should be done so Youkai Skills don't solely scale on Elemental ATK. That way we don't have this issue with Summoners that can invest heavily into defensive stats yet still deal high damage.

How about instead of using the post's idea for Scaled Weapon Power, we instead make it a % of specific stats varying on the Skill and the Youkai that would be using it.

For example, let's take something like Byakko's Thunder Claw. Perhaps instead of 340% Lightning ATK @ Level 60, it would scale by 150% of the user's STR (which works well for Byakko since he already has a lot of STR) plus 100% + 2% per Byakko's Level Lightning ATK. (220% Lightning ATK @ 60)

The amount of Elemental ATK Scaling would ideally also vary based on what kind of other benefits the skill has. Byakko's Thunder Claw would have high Lightning ATK scaling due to it only dealing damage and having short range compared to other Youkai skills, while say Seiryuu's Hunter Wind would have comparably less Wind ATK scaling due to it applying a hefty damage increase debuff.

I'd also like a damage nerf (say 15% less) specifically for summoners using Youkai skills directly to make up for the fact that they can build stats and Elemental ATK far better than Youkai can.

[Neus]

Well, using a percentage of a user's stat is basically just using its elemental ATK at a different rate. It would also greatly complicate the damage calculation. I think it's probably more sensible to start with a scaling nerf, and possibly making Youkai skills have lower scaling when they're evoked instead of used by the Youkai themself.

[Autumn]

We could always also make it so that summoner spells end up using WIL + Some elemental ATK for the summoner in question, if we're tying it directly stats and not elemental atk, because WIL in the end is still a big part of tome scaling and is widely considered an offensive stat.

Something like 150% of your WIL + 150% of the corresponding elemental ATK.

This'd make it so that something like Hunter's Wind with the average 50 scaled WIL and 80 wind ATK be something like 195 wind magic damage.