Two years inactive, summoner worth coming back to?Follow

Summoner was and probably still is my favorite class in any MMO and as I cruise the forums now I see loads and loads of changes to the job/game.

I unsubbed somewhere after WotG came out and Astral Flow burns were the new big deal for summoner. These new FFXI changes look pretty cool, and ive got a few questions about general gameplay / smn class. This being said, I like summoner, I want to play it. Not wait around for people to ask me to switch to RDM or BRD.

Merit Parties- Do they still exist or is Abyssea what everyone does. If Abyssea, is summoner viable in Abyssea and will 'Returning lvl 75 summoner looking for Abbyssea' get a response when im LFG? Or is it just like merit parties where the same few jobs are asked for and thats it. Example ('lolSMN looking for merit party lols??? Please get on your RDM plez or continue to AFK in WG all day with your flag up')

Avatars- Did any of them change? I took a look at the SMN page and still see the ones I had. I had heard there were 2 new limit breaks (Alex and Odin iirc). Can I solo these at level cap and if not, how do summoner's go about getting the new limits / new avatars if they exist. Do they have some new BP rage/wards other than the 70 and merit ones?

Gear- I still remember how happy and my legitimate excitement when I finally (I mean after I begged and pleaded with my LS to come out and help) got the YY robe. Is all that gear / AF2 obsolete now? (If so, forever damn you shiki and your crap drop rate even with two 75 thieves) Am I going to have to go straight to the AH and hope my characters have a few million gil?

Perp- Can you run around with avatars other than carby out permanently now (with a little effort gear wise of course)? I remember it was possible at times back at 75 to have them out with AF2 horn/weather etcs. Is this common now? Can I actually get mana back and have them out?

I apologize for the crazy wall of text. But it seems SE fixed some of what was wrong with FFXI and SMN. So before I drop the 40 or so dollars on buying /re-subbing Id like to find out whats going on.

Thanks in advance!!

SMN is very high demand thanks to Alexander (Perfect Defense which is amazing for zergs) and a new blood pact that Ramuh got called Shock Squall which is an AOE triple-duration stun ability.

Alexander is pretty key in defeating a lot of the high-end events; Absolute Virtue, Pandemonium Warden, Arch Dynamis Lord, pretty much everything in Legion, etc. Most groups want to have at least one SMN while doing Voidwatch as well, which is another new big chunk of content.

You won't be super high-demand in Abyssea and may struggle to get some stuff done in there, but SMN can solo a lot. You'll just struggle to find traditional groups that are able to proc yellow weakness (long story) which helps you get drops faster.

Long story short, there's still a strong place for SMN and you won't have any trouble.

P.S. It's possible to get insanely cheap avatars now. I get 8mp/tick refresh with Garuda out when I'm on SMN/RDM. SMN with good equipment simply doesn't run out of MP anymore, ever.

You'll need 2-3 macros to swap all your gear. There's a simple trick to simplify the process. You can swap out a full set of gear by hitting Ctrl-1 (or Ctrl-2, Alt-1, etc) 3 times in quick succession, swapping out 15 pieces (there are 16 gear slots, but SMN only fills 15 of them).

Ctrl-1 Set-1
/equip gear "..."
/equip gear "..."
/equip gear "..."
/equip gear "..."
/equip gear "..."
/macro set 2

Ctrl-1 Set-2
/equip gear "..."
/equip gear "..."
/equip gear "..."
/equip gear "..."
/equip gear "..."
/macro set 3

Ctrl-1 Set-3
/equip gear "..."
/equip gear "..."
/equip gear "..."
/equip gear "..."
/equip gear "..."
/macro set 1