Guild Wars 2

^title

As it stands, whilst summon builds can be a little fun but the summons themselves fall a little flat

Perhaps a shared identity of sort could help fix this?

Ranger spirits can now be used like that of necro minions but do xyz to keep them seperate

Ele’s and conjures would be likened to engi kits and once again abc to keep it separate
Ele’s and their elementals would be tweaks to similarity to minions with 123 to keep them different

Guardian’s with spirit weapons are at a point wherein the choice lies between minion esque or kit esque

What are your thoughts on this matter?

What needs tweaking/changing with summonables?

Would you prefer a duration based minion or health based? That is last until they die

Should minions gain some sort of buff from pc’s?
Be it to auto gain boons when pc has on?
Be it gain xyz% of stats?

Thank you for reading,

-Phyrak

I don’t understand how you say “Make them the same, and then do something to separate them.” Unless you have a particularly good replacement idea for keeping them distinct, I feel like it’s overlooking possible reasons for the distinctions you want to erase in the first place.

I main an Ele, and I’ve used the Elementals a lot since launch. In my opinion, they’re perfectly fine the way they are. They’re useful (especially Rocky,) and they don’t die easily. (ESPECIALLY ROCKY.) No buffs, nerfs, or other changes needed that I can see.

Redenaz.8631:

I don’t understand how you say “Make them the same, and then do something to separate them.” Unless you have a particularly good replacement idea for keeping them distinct, I feel like it’s overlooking possible reasons for the distinctions you want to erase in the first place.

I main an Ele, and I’ve used the Elementals a lot since launch. In my opinion, they’re perfectly fine the way they are. They’re useful (especially Rocky,) and they don’t die easily. (ESPECIALLY ROCKY.) No buffs, nerfs, or other changes needed that I can see.

In the case of ele’s, elementals are duration based
With such a change, elementals would now become health based

Then in turn, a way to keep the distinction between minions and elementals is the effects they have on friend and foe and possible buffs you could attain from them

With earth ele, gain rocky skin + toughness and what have you etc
Such would allow for a distinction between ele and necro summons whilst have the summons be based on hp rather than duration

I see how this would change the game a little; I don’t see how it would improve the game enough to be worth the effort.

Can you explain why you think time-durations on summoned creatures “fall flat” and why it’s bad enough that it requires a change? Can you also explain why HP-duration is better?

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

I see how this would change the game a little; I don’t see how it would improve the game enough to be worth the effort.

Can you explain why you think time-durations on summoned creatures “fall flat” and why it’s bad enough that it requires a change? Can you also explain why HP-duration is better?

I’m have a few 80’s
One of which is an ele,
In an attempt to see how good the elementals themselves were, I put them on my bar and tried all game types
Competitively to how a necro and minions work

Hp> duration due to not dropping out mid battle at 75% hp
Such is the same for ranger spirits,
Their duration can only be of so much use
You can use their active still and then the skill itself goes on CD and then the elemental then goes on CD due to having duration

As for leveling my necro as an MM, minions with no duration and based on hp fair far better when it comes to overall dps but still fall behind due to a lack of scaling

Fun yes, but does need some buffing imo

I still don’t understand how the game would be better if this was changed. Your argument appears to be that all summons should last the same amount of time because …they don’t last the same amount of time now.

But each type of summons offers different features, and so it makes sense that they have different mechanics for duration, too. Plus, there are other ways to buff say the air and water eles (which are imo a bit weaker), other than making them last longer — I think that would be both more fun and more interesting.

Illconceived Was Na.9781:

I still don’t understand how the game would be better if this was changed. Your argument appears to be that all summons should last the same amount of time because …they don’t last the same amount of time now.

But each type of summons offers different features, and so it makes sense that they have different mechanics for duration, too. Plus, there are other ways to buff say the air and water eles (which are imo a bit weaker), other than making them last longer — I think that would be both more fun and more interesting.

The change from duration to health would help a lot with elementals and such as there would still be ways to keep them seperate – see offensive chain skills like the warriors rip with OH sword
Such is what could help to flavour the summon whilst having them out for a greater period of time

All summons should last until they’re killed (either by enemies or deliberately by you) or you swap the associated utility skill, like necromancer minions do.

Answer: Yes.

Caveat: It should never happen.

Given how ANet tends to nerf summons and pets based on the tears in PvP, it would mean that stats, or the conversion, would get nerfed as well.

Again, while I would love this to happen, the amount of crying because of it, especially because smart players who would stack the right stats, would be epic.

I’ll give you an example: Let’s say I have stacked healing and use the fern hound. My hound heals on the same level as me with its howl. The howl also purges conditions and gives a near continuous regeneration. And I also use Rune of Water. So, every time I heal, the hound also heals with an AEO burst of water as well.

Now bring this scenario into a zerg in WvW? With three or four other druids? Exactly.

Therefore, it’ll should never happen.