Summon damage has notoriously been underwhelming for a very long time. There have been attempts in the past to improve summon damage by scaling AP with your character, however, there are still many factors that are not being applied. It is also quite confusing on what does or does not get applied, thankfully there are some dedicated BDO scientists who have done a lot of thorough testing and have it documented.

A major example of how this negatively affects certain classes are when a grind spot provides a damage enhancing buff. These include, the underground gyfin buffs, serendia elvia weapon buffs, calpheon elvia light and darkness buffs, and the ulukita buffs. These buffs are direct multipliers that heavily impact clear-speed, however, do not get applied to summon damage.

Another important factor that does not get applied are special attack multipliers from sources such as from draughts, elixirs, crystals, and addons. This means that our summon's critical damage, back attack damage, and down attack damage are naturally weaker. This is highlighted in the PvE Damage Document under the summon's section linked below.

One other factor that players have investigated are the accuracy numbers from summon damage. There are strong suspicions that accuracy is not being applied properly which is resulting in more misses than expected. However, this is challenging to test accurately since it requires another person to report the misses correctly.

Ulukita buff in Yzrahid Highlands for summons: https://youtu.be/gLuR9Rt0y_8?si=_tbXCbzbrPneiBKT

-A video that showcases how that could possibly make grind spot buffs work for summons by having it not tied to your character and applied to the summon itself like the ulukita buff zones.

BDO PvE Damage Document:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ikkAhwMTdrz1Z7PMuzRBjyGttrk20eFdMTstMTOunqo/edit#heading=h.yq5naae1tscj

Despin's Post on Summon Accuracy:

https://www.naeu.playblackdesert.com/en-US/Forum/ForumTopic/Detail?_topicNo=33611

Dont listen to him PA... He isn't telling you that LILJAY is a Summon.... HE IS TRYING TO GIVE LILJAY TOO MUCH POWER!! Blink Twice Jay if LilJay isn't forcing you to write this.

after all these years, i think PA cant physically do that.