SMN Merits: Group 2

I've just finished levelling Summoner, and am considering what to merit in Group 2. There's six choices and quite honestly, I have no idea which is any good, or which is must have, etc.

Any pointers in the right decision welcome!

At the moment I'm considering Grand Fall & Wind Blade 5/5. Yes? No? If no, what should I do instead?

Thanks in advance!

I had no idea what to do for group 2, so I got 1 in each with the exception of Thunderstorm and 5/5'd that~

Its all about persoanl taste . putting 1 in each of the 6 then choosing 1 or 2 to put the other 4 into is your choice . The only affect the Merits have on the strength of the BP it self is how much TP you gotta accrue to deal decent DMG (this is more so if you are 5/5 phys in group 1 which 99% of SMNs are ) . Since we now get Holy Mist and the Fenrir one who's name eludes me ATM , not to mention Nether Blast (which btw , Magic Group 1 affect , unlike Meteorite, Holy Mist is Unknown currently, but I say it is affected comparing DMG with other SMN who have no Magic Merits . i am 3/3 Phys and 2/2 Magic , but goin to 5/5 Magic sooner than later.) by unlocking all 6 you can now deal Magic DMG of all elements . A very useful thing when fighting , say , Armed Gears or any other NM/HNM with a changing Elemental Affinity (hello JoL) . W/o Group 1 MaB/MaCC merits , you'll want at least 100% TP to deal a decent amount of DMG with said Merit BPs . if your a 'freak' (hollerin at chu Shadowking) and your 5/5 Magic , your 1 Merit BPs will most likely Out DMG or be on Par with Lv3+ merits with no TP (you having no TP).Throw in some Avatar MaB Gear (Fay crozier Augments , some of the newer Gearz , ect ) and your Lv 1 Merit BPs(with 100%TP) will be about the Same DMG wise as your Lv70s , and they are Ranged Attacks .
For Abyssea purposes , no matter how your avatar deal dmg to the mobs , be it Lv70 BP , a merit BP , Holy Mist , normal Melee , the DMG is considered to be a Normal Melee Attack (perlesent).
hope this helps you make a choice .
on a side note i am Wind Blade Lv3 only , not having time to unlock any others , but do plan on having 5/5 with Windblade to Molest Kirin (@ 0% TP i have seen it hit him for 1k+ , with 100% TP it will regularly Out DMG Nether Blast . i suspect 1 more Lv will make it consistant along with goin 5/5 Magic Group1 and some Fay Cro Augments ).

A fully merited Group:2 BP Can be useful MB or not, very powerful on the right mobs, anything with high Defense or Evasion to be precise!

Fully merited, and with some gear choices focusing on Avatar:MAB, a Group2 Merit can outperform 70BP's consistently on anything and everything higher than Exp-level mobs (Granted the mob your fighting doesn't have insane Magic Resistance, like say Lord Ruthven).

That being said, as previously mentioned, they all do the same damage, pick which one will benefit your play-style the most.

Thunderstorm you can't go too wrong with, either way, i'd pick 1 to max out, and put 1 in each other one, giving you the ability to adapt to the weakness of the mob in any situation (to limit resists).

I would personally suggest Geocrush, as mentioned it has Stun added to it. Doing ~1500 DMG + Stun at the same time is quite powerful.

I suggest if your serious about group 2 merits in any way, to also max out Group1 "Avatar Mag.atk.bonus"



and in case my point was lost, i'll reiterate, i suggest choosing 1 of them to max, either your favorite or the one that will benefit you the most, and putting 1 in all the others to have the versatility to chose which you prefer.

Well, since no one gave a straight answer, heavenly strike will be the best for damage because of how mob weakness is spread out. However garuda is currently the cheapests avatar to keep out and therefore tp in. So I recommend maxing those two 5/5, so you will have magic bursts for both light and dark aswell as some favorite perks (kirin weakness and Ice theronody)

Thats because there is no straight answer for a question like this >.O! We'd need to know much more about what he uses his summoner for.

Everyone plays summoner differently, SMN may be one of the few jobs where almost no two will have the exact same merit lay out. For instance, my friend has 5/5 Geocrush since she duo's alot and the stun helps tremendously, as well stacked with the ~1500 DMG. I on the other hand have maxes Heavenly Strike since Shiva is basically useless otherwise and not much resists ice.

Whats best for one will not always be whats best for the other, i think the responses thus far have hopefully been enlightening enough for him to make his decision.

Thanks for all the input! Much appreciated.

In the end I've opted to put a merit into each Blood Pact so I have them (I've always been a completionist), and decided to put the last four upgrades into Wind Blade. I'm happy with my choice, Wind Blade seems to be pretty decent, especially on Kirin.

In abyssea, because of what atma are available, namely Atma of the Beyond, Heavenly Strike is able to have the highest damage output of any Tier 2 Merit BPs. I've had Heavenly Strike do 3.6k on average with spiked of up to 5.7k (Ice weak mobs like Aero murex) But Garuda's Wind Blade and Ramuh's Thunderstorm (Yes I changed 5/5 merits around) Only get up to about 3.1k Max.