Guild Wars 2

That’s it. I’ve played this profession for well over 300 hours and the more I play it, the more I see the abundance of condition/power specs as a silent acquiescence of how incredibly borked pets are.

Pet damage/survivability is fine and I suspect that it is fine as a tradeoff for having little-to-no-control of them, but in any kind of real PvP scenario (or even some PvE situations) the lack of an ability to swap targets, abandon combat, or do anything fundamental to any pet class makes them little more than a (mostly) mobile tower defense turret with a single cooldown.

Not to mention that the AI is so slow and clunky that it often takes a few seconds for the pets to even start attacking.

Pets are neither fun, nor viable. Please fix them.

They aren’t pets, stop using that word. You can swap targets, they will abandon combat when you have run a fair distance away (about 2000 I think). Why don’t we have control? Because they are NOT PETS. That point cannot be stressed enough. In GW1 they were called servants, now they are called minions. If you are looking for controllable creatures you want to play ranger, or you want a different game.

Survivability is not fine, in fact it is the single problem that keeps them from being more widely used.

They often are attacking your target before your first skill even lands, and are plenty fun for people who aren’t biased against them for older (though valid at the time) reasons. They are viable in certain situations like, you know, every build in the game.

Never anger Bhawb over his minions…. he loves them a lot!!

Yeah, sorry if that sounds aggressive (it looks angrier than I mean it to be). But this is like the 5,000th thread like this, and I’m sure we’ll have another one next week when this one dies. Also, we do have word from a dev (not official, it was in game) that they don’t want to give us control because it is the ranger’s thing. It’d be like giving us Steal, or Shatters, in a way.

Bhawb.7408:

Yeah, sorry if that sounds aggressive (it looks angrier than I mean it to be). But this is like the 5,000th thread like this, and I’m sure we’ll have another one next week when this one dies. Also, we do have word from a dev (not official, it was in game) that they don’t want to give us control because it is the ranger’s thing. It’d be like giving us Steal, or Shatters, in a way.

Yeah, it’s a sickening justification for laziness.

Laziness is not having the desire to make a change because it takes too much effort. They don’t want to make the change, there is no laziness involved.

While direct control would be “bad” (imagine a golem chasing down a low hp enemy then mid run swapping and charging down a enemy roamer), i do agree that necro minions need the old minion ui back (so that we can see who is low even if they aint close to us/on our screen).

100% agree with the party UI we got in GW1 (took them forever though, so I’m not getting my hopes up).

Minions have a very strange place in the Necromancer. They are not a profession mechanic (so don’t expect them to be treated as such), but they are the single most traitable utility-skill type in the game.
So while I don’t agree with the OP that we need more control, I do agree that they need a paradigm shift (word of the day, kittens). As I see it, Minions in the future could go one of two ways:

• the number of traits that affect minions dwindles. (Corruptions have only 1 trait, they could use some love.) Minions would gain the same status as Spirit Weapons on Guardians (utility skill), and we won’t really need the UI.
• the number of skills that create and/or affect minions increases, as does the amount of UI dedicated to minions.

There are a lot of pet-type skills in the game; stationary pets (turrets), strong single pets (Ranger pets), cannon fodder (Mesmer clones), High damage pets (Mesmer Phantasms), and Utility pets (Spirit Weapons).
The only thing that is missing is hordes of pets (Mesmers have a maximum of three) and I think that is what the Necromancer’s pets are supposed to be. They never feel like a horde the way they did in GW1 though.

I would like to see more skills that make more than 1 minion.

How about if instead of death shroud, life force can be used to caste many different minions? That would be pretty kitten. And amazing.

@BadJas, I very much expect the second to happen. Minions aren’t the profession mechanic for Necromancers, but they are very much one of the core themes that we have. I think we will see some Minion skills come into weapon sets with the addition of weapons, although possibly not many, and I hope to see at least one “trash minion” skill come onto our utility bar.

@infantrydiv, its been suggested before. We just can’t have the Necromancer class work as it is currently designed without DS. They could always come up with a weapon that has its own resource generation, and then expends that resource to summon minions, but that is the most I could ever see, and it still feels too “adrenaline-y” to me. But I find it unlikely that they could introduce a meaningful summon system based on F2-F4 without completely changing the entire class; and I don’t think anyone wants them to change the entire class just to make a new minion system.

Little side notes:
a) We used to have way more minions in beta (if traited 4 bone minions, 2 bone fiends and i think a option for multiple wurms), was too op because they soaked all aoe
b) I suggested that a long time ago for many necro skills, to use the charge mechanic (hold the button longer, it casts longer, more effects), thus you could summon more minions at the cost of not being able to use DS (grayed out like we have no LF) and pieces of LF being locked off (like Deep Wound/Overcast in GW), problem that comes with it How cooldowns work with em (its already kitten y when you use putrid and your full hp bone next to you explodes instead of the 1% hp one next to a enemy) and it would probably require to be a trait (and no necro wants more minion traits).

“Soak all aoe”… sounds sooo nice! Only that, and I will be back to Minionmancer in a blink.

And the best of all? The tons and tons of threads with everybody shouting “YOU ARE OP!!!! ARGHHHH!” at us.

I Heard minion builds suck and im a post patch necro just rolled can any1 tell me if minions are viable in any situation ever ??

Abraxius.6429:

I Heard minion builds suck and im a post patch necro just rolled can any1 tell me if minions are viable in any situation ever ??

yes

Abraxius.6429:

I Heard minion builds suck and im a post patch necro just rolled can any1 tell me if minions are viable in any situation ever ??

They became… adequate.
Also very much depends on the dungeon/playstyle.

^“Any situation ever” leads me to believe including WvW, PvP, and all of PvE, in which case there are many situations where minions are viable.

Bhawb.7408:

^“Any situation ever” leads me to believe including WvW, PvP, and all of PvE, in which case there are many situations where minions are viable.

If you really want a rundown
WvWvW – worthless on defending, charge sieges/anything where walls still stand, but good for roam/small groups
PvP – “bunker”
PvE – steamroll all open pve without mass spam aoe (so 99% of it);but a lot of dungeons punish minions because how lethal some skills become with more possible targets

I’d note that in PvP they actually work quite well in “glassy”-ish (although still a bit beefier than standard glass) builds either condi or power, although it is less commonly seen.

Andele.1306:

While direct control would be “bad” (imagine a golem chasing down a low hp enemy then mid run swapping and charging down a enemy roamer), i do agree that necro minions need the old minion ui back (so that we can see who is low even if they aint close to us/on our screen).

Yes yes yes 200% to this! That minion UI was the single best thing ever to happen to necros in GW1 and would be pretty amazing in this game too. I have a sneaking suspicion though, they won’t do it because they’re afraid people would complain about necros using flesh wurm as a sort of “proximity trap” in pvp. Basically by setting him out somewhere and running off then watching it’s hp bar. I know that now you can see it’s damage from far away when it attacks, but you’re not always facing that way while doing other things so people could just watch their UI. And we all know what happens when necro gets a new toy….I need not recap lol.

You can use him as a proximity trap right now, if he goes on CD for no reason then someone killed him.

Bhawb.7408:

You can use him as a proximity trap right now, if he goes on CD for no reason then someone killed him.

True, but they could have already capped a point by then or done what they set out to do. I’m just stating one of the possible QQ’s we would hear

I’m sure people will QQ, but its a very small, preventable amount of utility (entirely preventable, just don’t attack him), so I can’t see them using it as a reasonable excuse for no UI.

Golem shouldn’t despawn when wet. (Also swim, or some underwater elite that isn’t condi based mist would also rock)

Blood Fiend should regen out of combat like the others.

CD’s reset on res. (Other games even re-summon your pets on res for you. )

Respawn on tele. (Same with mini-pets!)

A ‘come back’ button and/or some sort of scaling mitigation so they an’t totally useless in PvE. (WD in D3 pets for example, no control. Were made useable when they removed lots of AoE/Standing in Ick damage, and made it so they could only take X amount of there max life per hit to stop them getting 1 shot)

These are the basics I think would stop GW2 minions being worst ‘pets’ in any game…

I think what they need the most in PvE is extra health.
They are already quite fine in open world and if they had more health they’d also survive long enough in most situations in dungeons.

Blood Fiend not regenerating is a bit annoying, but since you can just use Taste of Death and wait 20 sec (or 16sec) for a new one it’s not usually a big deal.

Can’t speak for PvP, dunno about that.

I will say that transformation destroying Minions and Flesh Golem not working underwater are two things I want to see changed.
And I’m not sure about the first one, seeing what going Lich as a MM does if you have Death Nova, heheh.

Minions doesn’t need more health, minion health is actually in a pretty decent place at the moment.

All more health would accomplish is that they’d die after 2 seconds of AoE instead of 1, but it would be devastating for 1v1 and similar scenarios where currently the opponent can choose to kill your minion or leave it. Making them unkillable juggernauts in such a situation would be bad.

What minions (and ranger pets and turrets and illusions/phantasms) do need is some kind of AoE damage reduction.

Minion health is close to fine as is. I think certain ones might use a bit more, but that is it. Its actually difficult to kill minions 1v1 without playing Ele or focusing them if the MM wants to keep them alive. They do need some kind of ability to stay alive better in team fights though, maybe a scaling AoE reduction over 1 player.

I agree necro’s pets need more brains.. ^^
And i want the option to sacrifice them all..

Merlin Dyfed Avalon.5046:

pets

I think you did that just to raise my blood pressure.

Merlin Dyfed Avalon.5046:

I agree necro’s pets need more brains.. ^^
And i want the option to sacrifice them all..

No thanks, I actually like how they operate atm. They don’t require extra microing (I’m not playing zerg kthx), but have just enough for you to have a decently high skill cap and feel like you’re doing something meaningful. They are finally really good on aggro (still lose it sometimes for pathing reasons, but that just comes with ANet’s bad map programming/LoS), and respond before some abilities even finish casting/hit.

As for killing them. They aren’t Mesmer clones, I like that some of them have unique on-death abilities (that are meaningful, not just kill becausewhynot, but are kind of like signets but not as badly designed as signets), but they don’t just feel like Shatters.

I guess i will have to face reality.
Guildwars original MM is dead…er..

pets.. ^^

The original MM was god awful design, and while I had fun playing it I will never regret that they had to axe it.

I agree MM is good as it is. We do have control over them. We can spawn them, encourage them to attack our target, kill them without mercy, and tell them to go do a skill on whatever catches their attention. What’s not to love about that third thing?

The updates to their health and mental discipline really helped a lot. I no longer want them dead shortly after I spawn them, instead opting for them to go down in a gooey splat of glory.

regardless of what some anet employee (was it even a dev?) supposedly said in game…

more control would be nice and it would increase their survivability through skilled play and not a “dumbed down”/lazy idea like adding more HP or other passive survivability.

Rangers have plenty other things pet wise necros don’t so that argument just doesn’t hold water. Pet controls in no way define a class except in some ridiculous arbitrary fashion that some people around here seem to want to cling to.

Dredlord.8076:

[…]
Rangers have plenty other things pet wise necros don’t so that argument just doesn’t hold water. Pet controls in no way define a class except in some ridiculous arbitrary fashion that some people around here seem to want to cling to.

Disregarding Pet Control, Ranger Pets aren’t that different from Minions. Pets have a larger variety, various AI-controlled abilities, can be swapped, and you can have only one out at a time. Other than that, they’re more or less the same (please correct me if you can think of anything else).

And what would give Minions elevated status over Turrets, Spirit Weapons, Spirits, Elementals, and Thieves?
You could give everyone Summon Control Panels, but Ranger Pets would need a serious rework in that case, in my opinion.
Honestly, at the end of the day it would probably make Summon skills way to attractive compared to other Utility Skills, and they would have to nerf Minions big time.

I played necro months ago, got sidetracked by other classes and went back to leveling my necro recently and have to say…
Minion AI has improved a lot from what I remember. They aren’t really running off to attack targets I was not attacking and hadn’t agro’ed. They aren’t spending the entire fight killing a weapon rack rather than my target and they only one who has a delay with attacking is Golem after using the skill (probably intentionally)
Would be nice to be able to set them on a target properly though and be able to see their heath easily.

BadJas.5178:

Disregarding Pet Control, Ranger Pets aren’t that different from Minions. Pets have a larger variety, various AI-controlled abilities, can be swapped, and you can have only one out at a time. Other than that, they’re more or less the same (please correct me if you can think of anything else).

In my opinion they are quite different. Minions are definitely a step above all other summons, but still below Pets. What Pets have that minions don’t:

1) They can take actions completely separate from the ranger. This means they can be called back, told to attack something completely separate, etc; but they aren’t tied to the current target like minions are.

2) They actually have abilities and the AI to use them. Minions just AA a target, pets actually have a set of abilities that they use, and generally speaking know how to use.

3) They have an entire stat devoted to them. Minions get a shared tree that is part minions, part defense, part staff, Pets have their very own tree that is nearly full of traits that enhance pets, along with a specific stat boost that does nothing for the ranger, it only boosts their pet’s stats.

The specific and important parts of that is that while Ranger Pets are bound to their ranger and are commanded by them, they are still individual entities that can take their own actions. They “think” on their own, they can take offensive or defensive actions separate of the ranger (although via commands), and have an entire tree devoted to them. Minions don’t. You can play Necro without minions quite easily. They are entirely bound to your actions, they can do nothing but attack the one unit you are attacking within their aggro radius. And they are still secondary mechanics to Necromancers; even in an MM build Minions are secondary, being used to augment the MM’s power.

Bhawb.7408:

In my opinion they are quite different. Minions are definitely a step above all other summons, but still below Pets. What Pets have that minions don’t:

1) They can take actions completely separate from the ranger. This means they can be called back, told to attack something completely separate, etc; but they aren’t tied to the current target like minions are.

2) They actually have abilities and the AI to use them. Minions just AA a target, pets actually have a set of abilities that they use, and generally speaking know how to use.

3) They have an entire stat devoted to them. Minions get a shared tree that is part minions, part defense, part staff, Pets have their very own tree that is nearly full of traits that enhance pets, along with a specific stat boost that does nothing for the ranger, it only boosts their pet’s stats.

[etc. etc.]

I completely spaced on the Beast Mastery, you’re totally right about that. I kind-of mentioned #2, and I was disregarding #1 for argument’s sake.
What I was trying to get across (but failed at miserably) is that if we would get control over our Minions, they would be on par with Pets – or maybe better because of we can create a whole bunch of them – right out of the gate.

And I don’t know if anyone cares for a lore-standpoint, but they are masses of reanimated bone and muscle of fallen friends and foes. Expecting them to do anything other than mindlessly attack whatever is in front of them would be giving bone and muscle way too much credit.

I think there are plenty of reasons to not want a ton of control over them; lore and gameplay, both from the side of not wanting to step over Pets (I think Pets should be a unique mechanic) and from the side of not wanting to muddle minion control. I don’t want to play MM to play an RTS. I do enjoy meaningful and strong actives, and having them as a secondary mechanic, but I feel like getting more control starts dipping more and more into it being more annoying than fun.

There are also reasons to want control over them. Mainly QoL things, like pulling them away to control aggro, and other things relating to keeping them from messing you up, I just don’t see them as big enough reasons.

Also I want to keep up that part of the tradition. Minions are undead servants, and as they are currently implemented into the game they are extensions of you. Pets can act independently because they are independent creatures that have a bond with you (you can even name them), and thus both have the independence to not be mindless, but also a good reason to listen to you. Minions on the other hand are more like living spells. You create them, they track your target, and then can be ordered to do something, but at their core they are nothing more than living single target spells.

(On a side note I don’t think we actually have much of differing opinions, I just wanted to point out that Pets actually differ quite a bit from summons, as it irks me when people call them pets.)

Bhawb.7408:

(On a side note I don’t think we actually have much of differing opinions, I just wanted to point out that Pets actually differ quite a bit from summons, as it irks me when people call them pets.)

(I noticed)

Anytime I start to feel bad about my minions dying miserably in aoe…I go play my guardian and toss out some spirit weapons, then realize minions aren’t so bad after all :-P
We just really need that hp bar menu like was mentioned earlier. no special controls, just that status menu of our little flesh bags.

Some kind of at least very vague command system that we could use would be really helpful. Simple “focus on that target” “come back to me” commands would be lovely.

minions are in a “strong” spot in many ways.
1. The flesh golem (when traited) has a higher health than is possible by any player in the game.
2. Bone minions have extremely high self synergy (combo finish with themselves [death nova], large AOE, unblockable, ect)
3. The shadow fiend has the third fastest life force generation out of our utilities.
4.Blood fiend is quite possibly one of the best heals in the game due to passively healing more than 4.5k every 20 seconds and being available for a burst heal.
5. Minions now get agony resistance
6.When siphoned by lupicus, even if all your minions get siphoned at once, lupicus recovers less health than if he siphons one player.
7. Jagged horrors are under appreciated. A free bleed on each hit, and walking death nova bombs? yes please!

In all honesty, the only things holding minions back are:
1. Death nova is bugged in that, when a minion is killed by an active skill (putrid explosion, fetid consumption), it doesn’t trigger the direct damage burst.
2. Minion AI is still a little wonky (bone minions hesitate for a moment) but behaves a lot better than how they did on release.
3. Reanimator IMO should also proc off of minions dieing.

One thing’s for sure, Minions can’t be controlled directly and I don’t think they ever should. That’s the ranger’s class mechanic.

I want sigil of demon summoning to work properly and start gaining charges again after the last demon has died

striker.3704:

In all honesty, the only things holding minions back are:
1. Death nova is bugged in that, when a minion is killed by an active skill (putrid explosion, fetid consumption), it doesn’t trigger the direct damage burst.
2. Minion AI is still a little wonky (bone minions hesitate for a moment) but behaves a lot better than how they did on release.
3. Reanimator IMO should also proc off of minions dieing.

One thing’s for sure, Minions can’t be controlled directly and I don’t think they ever should. That’s the ranger’s class mechanic.

1. Not a bug, its 100% intended.
3. I just think they need to completely rework Reanimator’s mechanics. Summoning Jagged Horrors is cool, but one every 30s on death just isn’t good in many situations.

Bhawb.7408:

striker.3704:

In all honesty, the only things holding minions back are:
1. Death nova is bugged in that, when a minion is killed by an active skill (putrid explosion, fetid consumption), it doesn’t trigger the direct damage burst.
2. Minion AI is still a little wonky (bone minions hesitate for a moment) but behaves a lot better than how they did on release.
3. Reanimator IMO should also proc off of minions dieing.

One thing’s for sure, Minions can’t be controlled directly and I don’t think they ever should. That’s the ranger’s class mechanic.

1. Not a bug, its 100% intended.
3. I just think they need to completely rework Reanimator’s mechanics. Summoning Jagged Horrors is cool, but one every 30s on death just isn’t good in many situations.

It’s intended? If you could, can you give me a source on that? I think it’s odd they would do that. . .

That is not direct from a dev, it was posted by Zombify (who talks with them). Its because they felt (mainly on Putrid Explosion) that a 1.5k (ish) additional direct damage on sacrifice was too much. It would have added 2-3k more damage to Putrid Explosion, which is hardly lacking already.

I don’t think its so big a deal on Blood Fiend or Flesh Wurm, either way. They are rarely going to trigger it in that way, so on one hand its why not? And on the other hand it makes sense for consistency and clarity (and it’d almost never hit anyway).

striker.3704:

minions are in a “strong” spot in many ways.
1. The flesh golem (when traited) has a higher health than is possible by any player in the game.
2. Bone minions have extremely high self synergy (combo finish with themselves [death nova], large AOE, unblockable, ect)
3. The shadow fiend has the third fastest life force generation out of our utilities.
4.Blood fiend is quite possibly one of the best heals in the game due to passively healing more than 4.5k every 20 seconds and being available for a burst heal.
5. Minions now get agony resistance
6.When siphoned by lupicus, even if all your minions get siphoned at once, lupicus recovers less health than if he siphons one player.
7. Jagged horrors are under appreciated. A free bleed on each hit, and walking death nova bombs? yes please!

In all honesty, the only things holding minions back are:
1. Death nova is bugged in that, when a minion is killed by an active skill (putrid explosion, fetid consumption), it doesn’t trigger the direct damage burst.
2. Minion AI is still a little wonky (bone minions hesitate for a moment) but behaves a lot better than how they did on release.
3. Reanimator IMO should also proc off of minions dieing.

One thing’s for sure, Minions can’t be controlled directly and I don’t think they ever should. That’s the ranger’s class mechanic.

1. All other elite summons by default (as in not traited) got more hp, golem on the other hand has the hp of a ele… he (as all summons) just got stupid amounts of armor.
3. Fiend is also the most sluggish cast and really easy to squish.
5. As to all summons and pets since patch, your point is?
6. No a minion has between 9k and 10k as mentioned before (up to 15k when traited), so that is 4 eles getting drained, or in case of a golem/fiend a ranger. Jhorrors are the only that kinda count since they degen faster.
7. You forgot the self degen and the fact that they have a tad less than 2k hp… right that helps a lot…

a) Not a bug devs confiremd it would be op
b) Pathing is still kitten (as is for all) ai actually very functional now
c) Reanimator shouldnt even be a (minor) trait.

Bhawb.7408:

That is not direct from a dev,

Was asked on one of the 1000 small podcasts that are around on reddit. Pretty sure it was JC/chap that said both because of easier code and damage.

Can someone log on and test minion HP with me? It’d be really easy to test (BiP), and then we’d have better numbers than the crappy tests I’m getting now. I just need two people, and my guildies are being noobs.

I mostly just want my Fleshie to learn how to swim. I hate having to bring Plague as my elite underwater.