Guild Wars 2

Hello all, with the recent rise in popularity of the minion mancer plus additional heals to both the spirit ranger and mesmer I think it’s time we start discussing potential ways to deal with the vast amount of AI clutter we currently have in the game. The suggestions listed below are my personal opinion only and aim to reduce some of the issues that minions and summons have.

The suggested changes will hope to achieve the following points:
More uniformity in Summon/minion characteristics
Less Combat Clutter
Increasing Active Play (for the summoner)

Generic Changes,
Targeting – auto target should be to the player and never a minion/clone. If the user wishes to target the minion/clone it should be done by manually clicking on the desired minion/clone. In the same vain, nearest target/next target should only select players, if you want to attack the AI, manually target them.

Obviously this effects Mesmers pretty drastically hence I suggest phantasms be treated differently to clones in that their current targeting system remains unchanged.

- Make the minions/summons transparent, even more so than the Mesmer clones. Enough so that the player stands out without question (even an Asura).

-Give each minion/summon a timer similar to the spirits with but make them all uniform. The active time can be debated although I think a 1 min up time is reasonable for both the attacker and defender. This stops minions being summoned at the start of the match and last indefinitely but makes the user plan on when to summon them.

-Allow attacks to pierce minions by default, preventing passive play from the summoner which currently allows him to hide behind his minions, avoiding damage. I think this is the biggest issue currently with minions. The increased transparency + ability to be pierced should go a long way to reducing that “cluttered” feeling. In the same vein due to this change effecting Mesmers the most, only phantasms can be pierced, clones absorb the damage.

*Note this should be a pvp only change

-Banners and conjured weapons should have a HP bar (pvp only)
This will promote actual thought in placement within a node and allow some more counter play to regen warrior bunkers. This also makes sense logically in that a banner shouldn’t be “immune” to damage in the thick of a fight. In the same vein an Elementalist’s conjured weapon should also have an HP bar to prevent them being left on the ground indefinitely until their timer runs out.

Exceptions – Elite Minions/Conjures
Being elite skills I think they should remain how they are currently implemented and be exempt from the proposed changes as they should still be seen as a much more powerful version of the utility skill. This effects the flesh golem and elite banner the most.

There we have it, my humble suggestions on improving the current AI/summon spam we have. Feel free to discuss/debate these ideas or suggest more/better ways on dealing with the issue.

Yes, IMHO the very essence of pvp battle involves the player versus player, not the player versus minion-zoo-clon-park) I can understand one, even two “assistants”, but this here is a crowd)))) Sometimes just getting ridiculous and do not even want to continue the fight)

I understand all of them but the mesmer. The mesmer is supposed to “trick” you. That’s the point of the clones, not phantasms. That’s why they do basically no damage and have absolutely no health. The phantasms are obvious because they deal more damage and aren’t supposed to trick you. You would be destroying the mesmer if clones were transparent and not targeted as well.

I mean I would understand if you didn’t want to target the phantasms. That’s fine but the clones wouldn’t make sense. Not to mention most of the time you do want to kill the phantasm as fast as possible since it outputs most of the damage that the mesmer has to offer.