Best way to go about meriting Summoner.Follow

My summoner is nearing 75 and I've gotten a full 20 merits as of today. It's been at 73 for a while now, mainly because I wanted to get a few things done like Evoker's Ring, getting summoning skill up, and other odds and ends pertaining to the job.

Now, I'm close to 75 and I'm wondering what I should put my merits into. Should I divide them evenly up between magic attack/accuracy and physical attack/accuracy? Which blood pacts should I focus on? I know Heavenly Strike is a must, but what about others? Do I need them all?

Also, outside of maybe Dynamis, Abyssea, and a few other places, how important is Odin and Alex if I don't have them right away?

I'm on mission 29 of AU, the Puppet in Peril, so I'm not that far out of reach, but I wanted to know if it was an absolute must before I hit 75.

Thank you for any feedback you might give. Have a nice day! ^^

I've done exactly the same, 5 P.Acc/5 M.Attack. 5 into Heavenly Strike and 1 each into the rest.

I have tried several different merit point setups on summoner. I landed on what everyone else seems to be saying:

5/5 Physical Accuracy
5/5 Magic Attack

5/5 Heavenly Strike
1/5 Other Tier 2

Abyssea is all about Shiva, same way that pre-abyssea was all about Garuda. Sure, other avatars work just fine in both areas, and sometimes are far superior, but it's still the Shiva Show these days. Yeah, I miss Garuda too.

I like to use the Ice Spikes ward on Shiva. It works suprisingly well, even on NMs, in abyssea.



*** Since we sort of drifted into a semi-general endgame discussion ***

Odin basically looks cool. He's usually outdone by Heavenly Strike, which is sad. Odin is also useless in NM situations (read: Dynamis).

Alex basically looks cool. I have used him legitimately one time, ever, on a Shadow Lord zerg. That's it.

Diabolos, on the other hand, stil has use when outside of abyssea due to his fatty boom batty refresh. Learn it, live it, love it. Plus: using Diabolos in Dynamis is pure badassery. He's also the perfect back line support avatar: you get a magic attack/defense ward, and a ranged rage so you can stay by the mages, with a fantastic favor.

The other oddball item to pick up that really screams Summoner is the Evoker's Ring. What can I say. Bling that never goes out of style. Either the -perp or the skill alone would warrant permanently melting it to your finger, with both it is The Shiny of the game for us.

Oh, and one day I tried to to the chocobo baby summon on the Dynamis Lord's head. My ls agreeded to it for the incredibly small chance for it to work. It didn't ; ;

Edited, Jun 1st 2011 2:26pm by Thydonon

lol I actually thought you might pop in and argue with me on that Perg. :D

You and your undying love for Garuda.

Yeah, totally the best wards, but I was never able to kick out Pred Claws in abyssea that would compete with Heavenly. Then again, I didn't have the VV/RR/GH trinity completed back then. One thing I want to note here: Perg has excellent gear. If I were to try to do what he does on Garuda I would either go out of mana or else I'd have to use a refresh atma and then I'd be better of back with Shiva.

Also, if you've ever seen Perg, I'd say his style is best described with terms like "suicidal" and "blatent disregard for personal safety". So, it's fun to team up with Perg.

I still find Garuda consistently outdoing Shiva. My gear is above average, but not quite Perg-above-average. I really just pull out Shiva on physical resistant NMs or I'm geared for magic (/WHM for oddball reasons, etc).

I used Alexander legitimately once. To get Odin. Which I used once, on Odin. (In Einherjar.)