Personally, I think summoning is great, but I thought it was great in the EA too.
They buffed the incarnate to become a super incarnate at 10 points, which is cool, but I haven't gotten to 10 yet to test it.
They also granted all incarnates a Taunt ability, which forces enemies to target them for a turn.
The trick in my opinion, is to invest heavily in the Summoning skill and make good uses of the 2 Infusion abilities on the incarnate.
Summoning improves their dmg, health, and all received armors by a whopping 10% per point, and the infusions grant a large amount of additional armors and a +25% damage increase for each one (this is unlisted in the ability description but shown on the tooltip for the buff).
The summon becomes quite durable and deals good damage, especially with their opportunity attacks.
I have been playing Summoner on Tactician and have felt very good about the performance of the abilities and the playstyle.
The flexibility to change their damage type to match the enemy is part of their Strength.
If you have the opportunity to prepare for a fight by Summoning and Infusing before the battle you will get a lot of extra mileage from the class as well.
Summoning also has great pairing with a skilled Hydro/Geo party member. The Summoning bonus to received armors synergizes with the extra armours granted from Hydro/Geo passives. The combination makes for an Incarnate that is hard to kill, but still easy to replace.
I tend to prefer the Blood Totems and Incarnates. The Blood Totems have a significant bonus to health over other totems, and the Incarnates gain a single-target physical nuke that also heals them, resulting in even greater survivability for both.
Edit:
I got a chance to try out the Incarnate Champion, at 10 points of Summoning, and it is very strong. I noticed a large health increase and a slight boost to damage as well. Plus they look damn cool.
I also tested out Supercharge, and it's still crap. The 50% increase to damage is additive with the bonus from Soul Bond, their Finesse, and also their One Handed skill.
Ultimately it means you waste a memory slot and AP to get a fairly small overall damage bonus and kill your summon the next turn.
Last edited by error3; 18/09/17 08:11 PM.