Guild Wars 2

Hey everyone. In the past, Bhawb and I have does a lot of discussing on Minion Masters, and Necromancers as a whole, and offered some feedback on where we feel the class should head. In doing so, we often focused on traits and bugs and other minor details about the MM but this time we decided to tackle just the pets as core abilities and I wanted to discuss with other Necromancers what we’ve come up with and some reasons behind our changes. Hopefully thes (at least some of them) make it to the big guys and show us some love.

To save space, I opted to section them into spoilers for better access.

Thanks for listening, and please feel free to add to the discussion and provide appropriate feedback. Developers, I really hope you hear us out on this. Robert, Karl and the rest of you, you’re our big hope, don’t let us down!

Post is finished, feel free to comment and discuss or ask questions. Thanks for your Minion Master Support!

This is the best criticism for the current MM struggles ive seen on necro forums. From my personal experiences in spvp i would often find a sword being shoved up my kitten by a thief with no utilities to counterplay because all my minions would be huddled together behind a wall on the other side of the map. In pve against bosses minions are simply not an option as the boss will one shot cleave half of them and then cleave again to leave you with no minions in a matter of seconds. Not saying its completely useless to be a MM but its very hard atm and every time i see a necro running MM I applaud them for trying to keep that iconic necro play style alive.

I couln’t have come up with better improvements than the ones you have even if i tried, however here’s my two cents for what its worth.

Shadow Fiend:
Cleave yes, but kind of random for this shade to cleave especially when the npc version doesnt SO I have a very flavorful idea. Lets change it to summon Flesh Reaver who is more likely to cleave. It looks more necro friendly though is a bit random but isnt a necro summoning a shadow fiend as well?
Active skill: Command Flesh Reaver to let out a Shriek that blinds in a 180 radius area with ground targeting.

Flesh Wurm:
Just as you said it is useless except for its teleport atm. SO in addition to the changes you suggested instead of an area poison on teleport make it into an area heal. This will make it an option for blood magic builds, MM builds, and a great utility slot for many, many other builds.

Bone Minions:
All i want for christmas is for these guys to look like these from gw1.
Thats it. It’d be so beautiful. Imagine having seven of these guys at your command with the new shout being introduced vs seven of the undead squirrel minions we have now.

PLEASE ANET WE’RE BEGGING YOU AS FANS WHO’VE BEEN HERE SINCE GW1 RELEASE.

@Hail, It’s actually funny you mentioned the part about the Flesh Worm’s active. I completely forgot what Bhawb has said about that, but he had mentioned having the poison + blast finisher happen at your feet as you teleport away. Either way, whether they make it a “consumption” like heal, or keep it the same, they definitely should consider having it happen at your feel before you teleport, since… Well, that’s usually where the fight is!

Bone minions are ugly, wouldn’t miss them. Do love the reavers. The bone minion appearance can just be kept for the jagged horrors.

As for the Shadow fiend, I like the functionality and I even sort of like having a shade. But I’d much prefer a more “spirit-like” shade, simply because I really like the teleport-blind mechanic, gives him a little extra uniqueness as a teleporty non-flesh being, the only in the mix. But I’d be fine with that too. Honestly, at this point, I’d do anything just to have his blind be useful on demand (and the life force) rather than 3 minutes later where it often doesn’t matter anymore. :P

Even though i don’t play Minion Master, it is a style of play I’m extremely interested in one day actually playing. I used to Love MM in GW1 and I’d like to be able to use it in GW2 as well.

Issue 1: This is something I’ve thought about allot. I’ve considered suggesting this idea myself, but could never find the right idea that would work for it. I’m still not sure about that idea, but I don’t dislike it.

issue 2: Yeah, I agree.

Blood Fiend: Hmm. I was actually going to suggest something like this for the signets. Like allowing Vampiric signet to heal you in Death shroud. But I wondered if that would just be too much with vampiric traits. Its hard to judge if the healing through death shroud would really be needed by either of these skills in combination with the blood magic changes. No opinion right now.

Bone Minion: I think they should increase the number of bone minions to 3 and give the explosion a cast time and ground target where the minions scream bloody murder while flying and spinning through the air before slamming into the ground with their iconic explosion! O_O But that’s just my opinion. Still 1 second recharge. This would make them a bit slower, but the play with it could be quite interesting.

Shadow Fiend: Yeah… Yeah.

Bone Fiend: Ditto ^

Flesh Wurm: I kinda like it where its at actually.

Flesh Golem: Yeah, I could see this helping. I stopped using this elite after its bugs started to get worse though. The more they changed the flesh golem the less it seemed to do.

I’d like to add something to this. I constantly go on and on about how minions should be spammable. Also sometimes mention how they should be disposable. Which I always have to explain that Disposable doesn’t mean fragile. I personally feel that minions need a baseline cool down reduction. I’ve suggested making minions cost life force or your actual life as to justify the recharge reduction. An Idea I doubt is popular. But having an extremely low cool down could make it so a well timed moa can counter us but also give us a chance to recover. Which I feel would be more important then just making them immune to it. But thats my opinion.

ronpierce.2760:

@Hail, It’s actually funny you mentioned the part about the Flesh Worm’s active. I completely forgot what Bhawb has said about that, but he had mentioned having the poison + blast finisher happen at your feet as you teleport away. Either way, whether they make it a “consumption” like heal, or keep it the same, they definitely should consider having it happen at your feel before you teleport, since… Well, that’s usually where the fight is!

Yes that is a great idea, but I was thinking since it was suggested that it inflict aoe poison on attacks maybe it should no longer have that poison on activate anymore. I think my idea would be a little bit too awesome though. The skill would be chosen over Spectral Walk any day.

ronpierce.2760:

Bone minions are ugly, wouldn’t miss them. Do love the reavers. The bone minion appearance can just be kept for the jagged horrors.

I just think the Reavers are so cool yet so rare within the game.

Lily.1935:

I’ve suggested making minions cost life force or your actual life as to justify the recharge reduction. An Idea I doubt is popular. But having an extremely low cool down could make it so a well timed moa can counter us but also give us a chance to recover. Which I feel would be more important then just making them immune to it. But thats my opinion.

I love this idea. Not only would it be a throwback to gw1 but it would make all the sense in the world that creating these horrors would cost a small percentage of your life or blood.

hailsatan.2865:

Lily.1935:

I’ve suggested making minions cost life force or your actual life as to justify the recharge reduction. An Idea I doubt is popular. But having an extremely low cool down could make it so a well timed moa can counter us but also give us a chance to recover. Which I feel would be more important then just making them immune to it. But thats my opinion.

I love this idea. Not only would it be a throwback to gw1 but it would make all the sense in the world that creating these horrors would cost a small percentage of your life or blood.

Would be interesting. I wonder if it should just only take life force while in Combat so players could enter the fight with their full minion bar force.

All these ideas are amazing ! We all know how expert Bhawb is. In addition to them , I beg Anet to teach our beloved Flesh Golem to swim or give us an undead great shark instead

Hmm, I’d prefer to keep Nova as it is.

We could get either Weakness or AoE Vigor for the minion transfer trait.

Besides, I am a hidden fan of the Rise! shout. I always liked the idea of creating tons and tons of lesser minions, while having option to slot “greater” ones as a utility.

And yes, give us back the old Bone Minions look! And Golem.

ronpierce.2760:

Blood Fiend:
-snip-

The problem with Blood Fiend right now, is that it isn’t a very good healing source, and certainly not reliable. And its not decent damage support either. I think Blood Fiend needs to be a minion that you need to kill first, before you kill the necromancer. Currently enemies are free to ignore the thing, since its healing is so pathetic. It should either do a much better job at keeping the necromancer alive OR it should keep the rest of your minion army alive through a vampiric aura. There needs to be a strategic reason why someone might want to target the Blood Fiend first, in order to take a MM down.

ronpierce.2760:

Bone Minions:
Issues: Too fragile and needs to cleave and follow master closer and Putrid explosion QOL changes are needed.

-snip-

Here I’m going to disagree. I don’t think these minions are intended to be anything but squishy. They should remain as such. They are expendable, and should remain expendable. But what I would like to see, if for an exploding bone minions to be more menacing. If a bunch of bone minions run up to you, that should be something scary. You should be able to defend against them with fire fields and such, but once they get to you, the explosion should do a lot of damage. That is where the real damage should come from, not from their melee damage.

ronpierce.2760:

Shadow Fiend:
Issues: Cast animation timing and needs to cleave.
Proposed changes: Like bone minions, as a lesser pet, should hit up to 2 targets. More importantly, Haunt needs its animated cast time (for a single blind…) reduced from 3 seconds to .25 or .5 at most.
Reasoning: There’s no sense in a 3 second cast blind, it’s just all around bad. Pets need cleave for PVE reasons and for better use in group pvp.

The timing indeed needs to be reduced. And I think this minion should spam blind like crazy. It’s only one minion, and you can avoid it. So give players a reason to avoid it. I also agree with the cleave. This minion is currently the most lack luster and pathetic minion in the necro minionarmy. This needs to change. This thing should be scary.

ronpierce.2760:

Bone Fiend:

-snip-

I’d like to see this minion maintain it’s distance from its target. If its target runs up to it, it could run away and find a new safe position to attack from. Apart from that, I think its fine as it is.

ronpierce.2760:

Flesh Wurm:

I agree with the aoe. I think placing this minion should be a strategic choice for the necro. Once it is in place, it should be tanky, and do a lot of aoe damage. Because if it is really strong, then sacrificing it to escape becomes a bigger deal for the necromancer.

ronpierce.2760:

Flesh Golem:
-snip-

I don’t agree on the wind up, because I like being able to quickly knockdown a fleeing target. If you give it a very clear wind up, then it is never going to hit anyone in pvp or wvw. Seeing that thing coming at you, is enough warning as it is. I do agree on the cleave and stability. It also needs to be able to swim.

Couple of notes to add. There is an alternative to Death nova change, that’s just my personal feeling. I personally don’t agree with pets doing so much Aoe damage when they die from an enemy doing their job but alternatively death nova could make its way to Master, or find a way to make one of the two less “minion only” in nature.

As for the bone minion HP buff, I’m not trying to make him tanky, but a bit tougher to survive in AOE situations just for a moment longer so he can even reach his target. Understand that in pve minions still have 71% more HP than pvp and they can frequently die before ever even reaching a target. I do agree with making their explosions deadlier again, however.

Flesh golem’s wind up doesn’t have to be a self-root. It just has to be noticeable. Him having a charge after .75 seconds of us casting it in that case would still be better than a 1.5 cast, and we could use him to defend us while stunned. So for maybe .75 seconds he’d stop attacking and ready his charge, but it would be faster dashing, more accurate, and quicker to execute, and the enemy would still get some visual warning. Of course, this requires that the animation does not make him stop moving.

Thanks for the good feedback guys, keep it up!

ronpierce.2760:

As for the bone minion HP buff, I’m not trying to make him tanky, but a bit tougher to survive in AOE situations just for a moment longer so he can even reach his target. Understand that in pve minions still have 71% more HP than pvp and they can frequently die before ever even reaching a target. I do agree with making their explosions deadlier again, however.

It should probably be a trade off. So if they do a huge amount of damage upon exploding, then obviously it should be easier for other players to kill them so they never reach them (you need to be able to defend against them). There should probably be some strategy demanded from the necromancer, so that he must send the minions in at the right moment. Right now minion behavior is so random and unreliable, that all strategy is missing. But if they add some better control, and demand strategy from the MM, then ultimately the pay off should also be equally rewarding. But for that we may need better minion control in general.

ronpierce.2760:

Flesh golem’s wind up doesn’t have to be a self-root. It just has to be noticeable. Him having a charge after .75 seconds of us casting it in that case would still be better than a 1.5 cast, and we could use him to defend us while stunned. So for maybe .75 seconds he’d stop attacking and ready his charge, but it would be faster dashing, more accurate, and quicker to execute, and the enemy would still get some visual warning. Of course, this requires that the animation does not make him stop moving.

What do you mean with more accurate? Unless the targeting or path finding bugs out (which it often does), the Flesh Golem is already accurate enough. The only way it could be more accurate, is if it was homing, and changed its trajectory while charging. And that would be a bit much.

I don’t think the extra wind up is really necessary. Right now you can already tell when a Flesh Golem is coming at you. He kind of stands out in a crowd, and so you are ready to dodge his charge attack, even without the windup. Basically, him walking in your direction IS the cue that he’s about to charge. If you give him even more wind up, then it would simply be too easy to dodge his charge, regardless of how fast he charges.

This also raises another problem: If the flesh golem charges even faster, then you might not be able to tell what is going on. I think the action needs to remain clear. I think the charge speed as it is right now, is just fine. No, the real problem is just the flesh golem getting stuck on terrain during its charge. That needs to be fixed. And it needs to cleave, so it is useful to bring him into a dungeon.

The accuracy comes from his dash happening closer to when you command it rather than the 1.5 second cast. The wind up is in place of having to lose DPS hardcasting its charge. No, it wouldn’t be homing. The speed change is actually a suggestion to revert the speed Nerf is just got a few patches ago, not sure you were aware of it or not. Also at this point, his charge being instant after our large cast, you can avoid it if he’s far away but it has virtually no tell from melee range. These changes would give a bit more counter play in melee range but make him better at charging foes further out, sort of a happy medium while also allowing us to use his special in pve without a massive DPS drop.

Good points. I was not aware of the speed nerf, since it’s been a long time since I actually used Flesh Golem. But if that is the case, they should definitely revert it.

I disagree with changing the minions to scale with precision and ferocity. As soon as minions are able to scale with something else, they’re gonna get nerfed in another area so they don’t become too strong base.

I also disagree with the change to the blood fiend. It’s one of the most reliable minions with attacking, and doesn’t make any sense flavor or mechanics wise to heal you without attacking.

cleave on the bone minions and shadow fiend are completely unnecessary. Bone minions have terribly low attack damage, and are there as explosion fodder. The shadow fiend, while decent with attacking, doesn’t really need cleave. If anything, make the AOE on his blind active bigger.

Minions are in a good spot for Tanky builds, and lacking in value for offensive minion masters. No additional changes would be made. This would help benefit a lacking area without affecting where they are already fine. They would not have to Nerf them.

I don’t believe you really use Blood fiend if you don’t see the issues with it. He has low HPs and is unreliable in any situation where he can be out-ranged, LOSed, CCed, Blinded or the enemy stealths. This allows him to have some benefit to level out his inconsistencies. Beyond that, with my suggestion, his damage wouldn’t really change, his healing would just be a bit more reliable in all parts of the game.

The cleaves are debatable, but the point is to make them more valuable in dungeons and team fights where currently MMs lack very much. They have decent use solo or 1v1 but have had scaling against multiple targets.

ronpierce.2760:

Minions are in a good spot for Tanky builds, and lacking in value for offensive minion masters. No additional changes would be made. This would help benefit a lacking area without affecting where they are already fine. They would not have to Nerf them.

I don’t believe you really use Blood fiend if you don’t see the issues with it. He has low HPs and is unreliable in any situation where he can be out-ranged, LOSed, CCed, Blinded or the enemy stealths. This allows him to have some benefit to level out his inconsistencies. Beyond that, with my suggestion, his damage wouldn’t really change, his healing would just be a bit more reliable in all parts of the game.

The cleaves are debatable, but the point is to make them more valuable in dungeons and team fights where currently MMs lack very much. They have decent use solo or 1v1 but have had scaling against multiple targets.

Oh, Anet would definitely nerf them.

Minions aren’t signets though. All minions have a basic functionality of “do a thing when they hit, or when you activate an ability”. Healing passively only makes sense as a signet. If the enemy uses their blinds, CCs, or actually goes out of their way to kite your blood fiend, you should be killing them with ease. If you lose at that point, there are MUCH bigger problems for you than what your heal skill is.

Minions not having a place in dungeons isn’t a problem with the minions, it’s a problem with the zerker stack and faceroll meta. That needs to be changed, we shouldn’t balance the rest of the builds around it.

Late EDIT: I also wanted to add, that if you make any stat scale for minions, it immediately becomes core as soon as you do because as of now, a Minion master doesn’t have any damage stats that scale for it.

Lets say for example, precision was changed for it. The only difference we’d see here is that Minion masters now run precision/vitality/toughness (If such a combo even exists) instead of soldiers, which leaves us at square one.

Also, running 2 damage stats on a minion master is suicide in PvP. People already focus you anyway, so why would increased damage help you? The only difference here would be that you would have a huge glowing sign over your head saying “kill me to make my minions go away”.

Every build has it’s own stats that are best for it, and it’s own stats that are useless to it. Condition damage is useless to a direct damage spectral build, that doesn’t mean we should force synergy with condition damage into there. The same applies to minions here. There’s no reason to fix what isn’t broken.

Maybe Blood Fiends attack should be changed to a shorter version of life siphon on the dagger 2 skill but balanced. It would probably mean blood fiend could attack easier at a range.

hailsatan.2865:

Maybe Blood Fiends attack should be changed to a shorter version of life siphon on the dagger 2 skill but balanced. It would probably mean blood fiend could attack easier at a range.

That’s not a bad idea, honestly. If he latched onto his target (prevents total loss in healing against stealth) and ticked his leech 1 time every second for, say 4 seconds and balanced the numbers around that, I’d be for it. I don’t see them re-animating him for it though, nor reworking the core mechanics on him. When we make suggestion we try (sometimes fail) to offer changes that are more “realistic” in terms of what we’d expect them to do. Often times adding brand new animations outside of a particle effect is out of reach, but never hurts to try.

One way or another he needs help against losing so much sustained healing so easily and frequently. Currently he’s actually weaker HPS than Healing Signet and that’s with a huge list of other drawbacks. :/

My only 2 wishes are 1. separate the 25%+ damage from Necromantic Corruption (ideally, put it on Flesh of the Master) so that I can still run my current MM build under the new specializations and 2. fix the minion AI so that they don’t stand around doing nothing during a fight.

Everything else I can deal with and have dealt with. I can even deal with the current minion AI.

I loved everything about this post….

These are changes that MM needs desperately. Keep up the good work!

DaShi.1368:

My only 2 wishes are 1. separate the 25%+ damage from Necromantic Corruption (ideally, put it on Flesh of the Master) so that I can still run my current MM build under the new specializations and 2. fix the minion AI so that they don’t stand around doing nothing during a fight.

Everything else I can deal with and have dealt with. I can even deal with the current minion AI.

I had suggested just making it base-line to free up the space on tooltips. Honestly, not many non-minion masters run minions, so a little more incentive wouldn’t break anything. And most MMs would still take either DN or FC because… they’re both great if you’re going to have the pets out anyways, and Flesh of the Master is necessary, so you’ll likely be in the line regardless. If none of the above, just simply adding 25% damage to Death nova would be fine since it’s already mutually exclusive with FC if they really wanted to enforce death magic on anyone with minions.

As for the rest, sure, a lot can be “stomached”, but stomaching isn’t ideal.