I want to learn more about smnFollow

so Im fresh new to the game and my rl friends will prob powerlvl me to 99. now my real question is(since my sub job will be white mage), whats the best avatar for groups? and what spells smn uses the most in groups? im thinking about going taru or mithra for smn but idk yet ;/

To add to what has already been said:

While you are leveling up (in exp parties), focus on having the main avatars (Fenrir, Titan, Levi, Garuda, Shiva, Ramuh). It's not terribly important to have the harder to obtain avatars (Fenrir, Diabolos, Odin, Alex). Diabolos can certainly be useful if you are in a party of black mages and want to just stick his refresh aura up (although that is a REALLY boring way to play), and Fenrir has decent DD, but the other avatars will suffice for exp.

If you want to do any endgame, though, you will need at least Fenrir, Diabolos, and Alex (as well as all of the other avatars you should have already had). Fenrir and Diabolos have certain avatar-specific bloodpacts that are required in events like Voidwatch. Alex has the ability to give your party perfect defense, so his usefulness goes without saying. Odin is the only avatar I can see really skipping out on and not missing much, but I'm sure he's got a niche use somewhere.

As for race, I'm a mithra SMN, and I play several other mage jobs as well. Once you hit 80+ and have abyssea gear, your mp pool won't matter. This is somewhat true for most jobs now, but especially true for SMN, in my experience, because we are so limited on how often we can spend mp anyways. I don't remember the last time, even outside of abyssea, that I truly ran out of mp. (RDM or SCH subjob will contribute to this, too. /WHM is only the best from 1-70). So really, choose whatever race you think looks best.

You should be aware that this will have many negative consequences. In my humble opinion, your first play through the game should not be powerleveled. You will end up as Lv99 with gimped skills (a very difficult thing to catch up on Summoner more so than most jobs) and no clue how to play the game. You'll know what to do in the most basic sense, but when surprising situations come up, that's when Summoner has the chance to shine through with their versatility/adaptability. Without leveling up the "hard" way, you won't have learned all the little enmity tricks that Summoners have, such as knowing how far away to stand from enemies.

As far as which race to choose, it can make a difference early on, but as you gain levels it will matter less and less. So basically, pick whatever appeals to you. Don't worry about which one has better stats or whatnot.