Curse

xenoranger · Jun 02, 2006, 04:13 PM // 16:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

where does an MM work now that it didn't before?

MM now can be used pretty much anywhere with a single corpse (thanks to golem). Then tendancy is to think of an MM as solely a multiple minion master, but even having just Golem is effective.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

Horrors are actually the weaker choice as they tend to clump = gg for your army in many cases.

Was always an issue, but I find you can spam BotM (like everyone says) and keep them alive even after an AOE. 122HP per every 3 sec. Yes, BotM is a bit over powered, but if you had VHOrrors, you could have them killing enough to cover the BotM diff and stay healthy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

Even if I could have 50 VHorros I wouldn't waste my time, I never needed them. They really are not worth the mana cast.

Using VHorrors makes sense b/c it's life stealing. Damage to enemy and health to you. Although, I Agree that Fiends have better AI and formation, you get nothing from fiends and VHorrors actually give back.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

pointless/useless I mean if the can do this just give us a damn minnion window

No argument there. I wish they would've done that. But when having multiple MM's (or stolen minions) before, I'd try to heal them which'd make my sacrifice pointless. It's as useful as Blood is Power when solo farming. Knowing you have minions is an asset (IMO). ALthough, an actual window would be much better.

HOPE YOU'RE READING THIS ANET

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

VS = Utterly USELESS

Not useless, but just less effective.

60 sec recharge (4 or more)= Nerf
Instance Recharge (3 or less) = Buff
10 Sec Healing = Nerf
Removes all conditions = Same

Yeah, more of a nerf than a buff, but I still find it a useful skill.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

right...

how very egotistical of you

besides we are able to play MM fine...I henched my whole way thought Cantha cept the last battle. That is entirely irellevent to our point that this was a stupid nerf

Yeah, it comes off as pretentious, but you have no clue how many times I hear people saying "oh, it's nerfed.. whoa the nerf." The point is they never try the new system. Sounds like you've tried it and actually have a right to complain, so I apologize for sounding harsh.

Recently, I've been branching out and I find that MM is the lowest form of Necromancing there is. It's effects may be visable, but it actually serves as a pretty weak way to increase your DPS or general effectiveness in battle. Since I've been playing SS, Vampiric Spirit, and other builds, I find that i'm able to kill much quicker than using an MM Build (even a WoSuffering MM Build).

Yeah, yeah... off topic, but still....
MM's are only good to differ the focus of enemies from a single target. They honestly help more in providing confusion for enemy AI. As far as teh adjustment goes, Verata's sacrifice is all that I see was really lost. The rest is OK with me.

oh, and 1 more thing.

BotM may be overpowered, but consider what it does if you're spaming it in a dual MM party?

5% (base sacrifice) + 20% (per Necro with 10 minions).

2 Necros = 45% sacrifice

3 Necros = 65% Sacrifice

It cant' be spammed effectively with multiple necros, so what you consider over powered, I consider a huge slap for trying to build a juggernaught horde.

Ensign · Jun 02, 2006, 07:38 PM // 19:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

Not useless, but just less effective.

I've played around with the skill a little bit and as far as I'm concerned the skill has no place on a serious MM bar. What you really want the skill to do is give some lasting regen, so that you can run to the next mob without having to stop and spam Blood of the Master all the time. But it isn't any good for that, even when you have three or less minions. You have to cast it a bit more than half as often (200 HP returned per minion vs. 122), but it has a two second cast time to BotM's one, and it costs twice as much on energy as well. You don't even save much on the health sacrifice since Verata's is a static 15% while BotM is a painless 7%-11% for 1-3 minions. I.E., it doesn't outperform BotM for maintaining a few minions, but turns into total crap when your character is working - what's the point?

The only real value you get from the skill is that you can maintain the 10 pips from Verata's Sacrifice on your minions (if you have 3 or less) in addition to BotM spam during combat, which gives them roughly 50% more healing. In my experience you spend very, very little time with 3 or less minions though, and if one of them is the refreshable Flesh Golem VS basically going to sit there dead most of the time.

It's not completely useless, but I'd only run it if there was absolutely nothing else I wanted on my character's bar. It's really marginal, but honestly once your MM is in full swing you only use like 3 skills so there's room to play with.

I would really, really like to see the skill turned into a better maintenence engine though. My only big beef with the MM as it stands is how tedious it is to run between mobs when you have to stop and BotM every few steps to keep your pack up. The old VS served that purpose rather well...I'm really not sure why they made the change they did, really. The current BotM is roughly 3x stronger than the old VS for keeping the horde healthy. I think most MMs would happily take a nerf to BotM for a VS that lasted long enough to get to the next mob.

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

Recently, I've been branching out and I find that MM is the lowest form of Necromancing there is. It's effects may be visable, but it actually serves as a pretty weak way to increase your DPS or general effectiveness in battle.

I would like to know what you're doing that outperforms 160 focused DPS on a target, plus enough chaff on the battlefield that your monks can play with one hand. I've found Spiteful Spirit to situationally kill faster, but not in a focused fashion, and it certainly doesn't mow through the trash anywhere near as quickly.

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

As far as teh adjustment goes, Verata's sacrifice is all that I see was really lost. The rest is OK with me.

I agree with that feeling. I like the minion cap, it's a no-nonsense way of dealing with ridiculous hordes, and the playstyle of less minions with the cap is kinda nice too - I particularly like how your energy gets smoothed out once you hit the cap. I think they still need some tweaking (melee minion attack rate, BotM getting toned down a little, Verata's Sacrifice getting a boost) but they're fine as is.

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

BotM may be overpowered, but consider what it does if you're spaming it in a dual MM party?

A horde that large chews through mobs ridiculously fast and absorbs virtually all the damage your team would take. One guy with BotM can maintain thirty guys as easily as ten. Throw on a couple of superiors, sit him in the back, and just let the monks heal him up. Trust me, they have nothing better to be doing with that much chaff around.

Peace,
-CxE

Carinae · Jun 02, 2006, 09:22 PM // 21:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

I've played around with the skill a little bit and as far as I'm concerned the skill has no place on a serious MM bar. What you really want the skill to do is give some lasting regen, so that you can run to the next mob without having to stop and spam Blood of the Master all the time. But it isn't any good for that, even when you have three or less minions. ....

I would really, really like to see the skill turned into a better maintenence engine though. My only big beef with the MM as it stands is how tedious it is to run between mobs when you have to stop and BotM every few steps to keep your pack up. The old VS served that purpose rather well...

Exactly! Oh this makes me very happy.

That's exactly the role VS served. It's not that VS is needed to fulfill the role of MM, but VS makes the MM role much less tedious. It's entirely a playability request, not a balance request.

Without it, a MM is casting BotM every 2.75 seconds ...indefinately, until you die or return to town. It becomes a real annoyance if you are exploring, and NOT doing a mission (ie: with no timer and no definate plan laid out to traverse)

I have a suggestion on how to fix it also:

Restore Verata's Sacrifice to its previous functionality, but make it easily interruptable.

This would solve the travel issue, but wouldn't give much benefit during combat. Leave BotM as is.

Manic Smile · Jun 03, 2006, 10:44 AM // 10:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

MM now can be used pretty much anywhere with a single corpse (thanks to golem). Then tendancy is to think of an MM as solely a multiple minion master, but even having just Golem is effective.

Agreed, the Golem does give some effectiveness back to the MM where there are fewer corpses but I feel the party would be still better served by a SS in that situation.

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

Was always an issue, but I find you can spam BotM (like everyone says) and keep them alive even after an AOE. 122HP per every 3 sec. Yes, BotM is a bit over powered, but if you had VHOrrors, you could have them killing enough to cover the BotM diff and stay healthy.
Using VHorrors makes sense b/c it's life stealing. Damage to enemy and health to you. Although, I Agree that Fiends have better AI and formation, you get nothing from fiends and VHorrors actually give back.

I find the initial energy cost to get a full group of VHorrors up just not worth the life steal, as well as what you have to trade off going with VHorrors > Fiends. I mean I haven't crunched the numbers but just to give a general idea: VHorrors which cost 25 and behave as Horrors which means they die more often vs. HA for 10 and fiends that last longer and do more damage?

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

No argument there. I wish they would've done that. But when having multiple MM's (or stolen minions) before, I'd try to heal them which'd make my sacrifice pointless. It's as useful as Blood is Power when solo farming. Knowing you have minions is an asset (IMO). ALthough, an actual window would be much better.
HOPE YOU'RE READING THIS ANET
.

All I am saying is that the window only tells you how many...you still have all the problems you had before: like where the hell did they go; for example, when the wonder off to kill some accidentaly aggroed mob...or get stuck on a wall. For the most part they'll group for easy care...espically with BotM the way it is now, so beyond knowing when I need to raise another one, countered by the fact the most just keep raizing, I see no need to know just the number. Having a party window with life bars and status bars...that would make a difference...and maybe even make VS somewhat useful.

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

Not useless, but just less effective.

60 sec recharge (4 or more)= Nerf
Instance Recharge (3 or less) = Buff
10 Sec Healing = Nerf
Removes all conditions = Same

Yeah, more of a nerf than a buff, but I still find it a useful skill.
.

It's not so much the stats of the skill but the fact that it no longer serves the purpose for which we used it: to keep stale minnions up longer. At the time mostly for transportation but now with BotM the old VS would even help in battle.

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

Yeah, it comes off as pretentious, but you have no clue how many times I hear people saying "oh, it's nerfed.. whoa the nerf." The point is they never try the new system. Sounds like you've tried it and actually have a right to complain, so I apologize for sounding harsh.

I agree with stuff changes people tend to just get upset by the idea before they try to see what was really done...but the change to VS alone is enough imo to say this nerf was at best a bit silly.

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

Recently, I've been branching out and I find that MM is the lowest form of Necromancing there is. It's effects may be visable, but it actually serves as a pretty weak way to increase your DPS or general effectiveness in battle. Since I've been playing SS, Vampiric Spirit, and other builds, I find that i'm able to kill much quicker than using an MM Build (even a WoSuffering MM Build).

The power of MM is not pure damage though at 9 fiends and a golem it does do pretty good damage. Minnions provied damage diversion as well as squishy protection. To give a good example I just beat Raisu Palace in 17ish minutes with my MM build and henches and no one died once.

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

Yeah, yeah... off topic, but still....
MM's are only good to differ the focus of enemies from a single target. They honestly help more in providing confusion for enemy AI.

Even in PvP...well ABs...that can be a big deal.

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

As far as teh adjustment goes, Verata's sacrifice is all that I see was really lost. The rest is OK with me.

I was never against capping minnion numbers...though I think 10 is too low, VS was plenty enough to sour the change for me.

Quote:

Originally Posted by xenoranger

oh, and 1 more thing.

BotM may be overpowered, but consider what it does if you're spaming it in a dual MM party?

5% (base sacrifice) + 20% (per Necro with 10 minions).

2 Necros = 45% sacrifice

3 Necros = 65% Sacrifice

It cant' be spammed effectively with multiple necros, so what you consider over powered, I consider a huge slap for trying to build a juggernaught horde.

Dual HA's with around a 9 in healing and 12ish in SR makes 3 MMs quit viable though beyond that with 10 minnions each...no. As long as the MMs spread out the HA's and stuff keeps dieing which with 30 minnions up it will, there are no problems. If there was a skill for down time *cough* VS *cough* it wouldn't be a problem at all.

Manic Smile · Jun 03, 2006, 10:56 AM // 10:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

The only real value you get from the skill is that you can maintain the 10 pips from Verata's Sacrifice on your minions (if you have 3 or less) in addition to BotM spam during combat, which gives them roughly 50% more healing. In my experience you spend very, very little time with 3 or less minions though, and if one of them is the refreshable Flesh Golem VS basically going to sit there dead most of the time.

I find my army better served by repeated BotM --> HA chains then going with VS and it's higher energy cost for as short as the duration is now.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

It's not completely useless, but I'd only run it if there was absolutely nothing else I wanted on my character's bar. It's really marginal, but honestly once your MM is in full swing you only use like 3 skills so there's room to play with.

Even then run Dark Bond or Infuse Condition...or even Death Nova.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

I think most MMs would happily take a nerf to BotM for a VS that lasted long enough to get to the next mob.

Strongly agreed...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

I would like to know what you're doing that outperforms 160 focused DPS on a target, plus enough chaff on the battlefield that your monks can play with one hand. I've found Spiteful Spirit to situationally kill faster, but not in a focused fashion, and it certainly doesn't mow through the trash anywhere near as quickly.

With just 10 minnions as it is now and the larger high lvl mobs in factions, imo, I have to say I somewhat agree that MM is no longer the damage provider it once was. With only 10 how often do more then 5 or 6 ever overlap on a single enemy. If we had some form of control, i.e. follow and attack my target there would be a huge difference.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

I agree with that feeling. I like the minion cap, it's a no-nonsense way of dealing with ridiculous hordes, and the playstyle of less minions with the cap is kinda nice too - I particularly like how your energy gets smoothed out once you hit the cap. I think they still need some tweaking (melee minion attack rate, BotM getting toned down a little, Verata's Sacrifice getting a boost) but they're fine as is.

I'm fine with the cap but give us more control and better choices in return instead of just BotM. Minnion menu and some simple group minnion controls I think would shut up any apponent of the minnion cap. Less is fine if we are allowed to use them effectively. As for the skills...the overall effect of a MM might be fine but I really can't see where VS could ever be called ok.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

A horde that large chews through mobs ridiculously fast and absorbs virtually all the damage your team would take. One guy with BotM can maintain thirty guys as easily as ten. Throw on a couple of superiors, sit him in the back, and just let the monks heal him up. Trust me, they have nothing better to be doing with that much chaff around.

Peace,
-CxE

kinda takes any of the skill out of playing a MM...

Manic Smile · Jun 03, 2006, 11:00 AM // 11:00

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Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

Restore Verata's Sacrifice to its previous functionality, but make it easily interruptable.

I'd be happy with VS like that.

Carinae · Jun 03, 2006, 07:36 PM // 19:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

With just 10 minnions as it is now and the larger high lvl mobs in factions, imo, I have to say I somewhat agree that MM is no longer the damage provider it once was. With only 10 how often do more then 5 or 6 ever overlap on a single enemy. If we had some form of control, i.e. follow and attack my target there would be a huge difference.

Manic brings up a good point here. We may be dealing 160hp/s of damage, but that's spread out over the whole mob. Sure, you can usually get them focused on the initial target, but after that....

It's not even equivalent to AoE, because that does X damage to each target, not X damage total spread out across each target.

Minion control would be nice or, alternatively, bump the cap to 16.

Ensign · Jun 03, 2006, 10:14 PM // 22:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

That's exactly the role VS served. It's not that VS is needed to fulfill the role of MM, but VS makes the MM role much less tedious. It's entirely a playability request, not a balance request.

Just to put the numbers out there from a balance standpoint.

Blood of the Master is 122 healing per minion per 5 energy per 3 seconds, coming out to 24.4 health per energy, and a bit better than 40 health per second. Verata's Sacrifice, for three or less minions, is 200 healing per 10 energy per 10 seconds, for 20 health per energy and 20 health per second. The difference in the skills is the time spent casting - Blood of the Master used maximally is 1.75 seconds casting out of every 3 (58.3-% of the time) while Verata's Sacrifice is 2.75 out of every 10 (27.5% of the time).

However, to get the same HPS out of BotM as Verata's Sacrifice, you only have to cast it once every 6.1 seconds. At that rate, BotM only requires you to be casting 1.75 seconds out of every 6.1, for 28.7% of the time casting. The energy cost of doing so is only 82% of what Verata's Sacrifice does. Hence for maintaining 3 or less minions, Blood of the Master has virtually the same time investment as Verata's Sacrifice, and around 4/5ths the energy cost.

The only reason to ever use Verata's Sacrifice is alongside Blood of the Master, to increase combat health regeneration. Alternating Veratas followed by 3 Blood of the Master and repeating, you can get around 54 health per second per minion. Of course stopping to raise more minions keeps you from ever getting that efficient. As far as which heal you should be casting mid-combat to maintain your minions, the two are virtually identical - BotM returning ~70 health per second spent casting, Verata's returning ~73.

I guess another way of putting it is that if Verata's Sacrifice never had a recharge for any number of minions, it still wouldn't be better than Blood of the Master.

The old Verata's Sacrifice, BTW, had stats of 42 health per energy and 13 health per second. The advantage was the time investment of around 8.6%. I think it was weaker than the new Blood of the Master, but fairly balanced with it due to the convenience - I think most people would run both if given the opportunity.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

Restore Verata's Sacrifice to its previous functionality, but make it easily interruptable.

I don't think the easily interruptable 'cost' would matter much at all, even during combat. It isn't like you take a lot of hits on a MM with all the chaff up front. Starting from the old version, if anything, you'd want to address the cast time or energy cost to make it less efficient. But honestly, given the new Blood of the Master, I don't think Verata's Sacrifice would need a nerf at all. It's comparable in power (the lower time investment is what makes it good because Blood of the Master is never optimised), and I don't think the worry is about giving minions too much combat health as the minion cap has addressed concerns about large, healthy minion armies.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

Even then run Dark Bond or Infuse Condition...or even Death Nova.

I like Rot and Swarm on death guys, they serve the same functionality in low minion situations. I'm also a fan of Taste of Death - especially with the Golem - though it's hardly essential. Toss in a couple minion skills and BotM, and your res. Plus you have a secondary, and other attributes, that you can play with since you have the points. You really don't have such a barren bar that you're going to throw on random crap like Verata's, the skill needs to actually do something to justify being there. It's just that you do have space for good skills if they happen to come along, you don't have to sacrifice core functionality (which in my mind is just Fiend + BotM) to get it on there.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

With just 10 minnions as it is now and the larger high lvl mobs in factions, imo, I have to say I somewhat agree that MM is no longer the damage provider it once was.

The value of the minions is not simply in that raw 160 DPS. It's that it's coming from a character that provides more defense to a team than a monk. All the damage that would otherwise go onto players goes onto expendable minions that are getting *incredibly* efficient heals from BotM instead. The monk can basically put a brick on his Signet of Devotion key and go AFK without ill consequences. Sure, Barrage/Spiteful/Triple Chop deal more damage in AoE situations, but none of those characters are providing such a strong passive defense.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

kinda takes any of the skill out of playing a MM...

I honestly don't understand this whole 'skill of the MM' argument. The character never took any appreciable amount of skill. I guess there were some competitions between MMs over who could get a bigger army through microing Heal Area and BotM, but who cares? You'd get 30-40 without even really trying, and an army of that size didn't even need a team to complete just about anything without even trying. I'd rather blow things up quickly and finish my objectives faster than try and micro another dozen meaningless minions into the horde.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

It's not even equivalent to AoE, because that does X damage to each target, not X damage total spread out across each target.

You do understand that even the good AoE options have to be hitting around half a dozen targets to be equivilent to that damage output, right?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

Minion control would be nice or, alternatively, bump the cap to 16.

What does bumping the minion cap another six have to do with anything? Oh, they could give us minion control...or, hell, why don't you just give the most powerful class another hundred DPS and we'll call it a deal.

Well, they could give elementalists the ability to target the ground with their spells...Oh, tell you what, how about you just make Fireball deal 200, and we'll forget that was ever mentioned.

Non Sequitur

Peace,
-CxE

Manic Smile · Jun 04, 2006, 01:26 AM // 01:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

. I think it was weaker than the old Blood of the Master, but fairly balanced with it due to the convenience - I think most people would run both if given the opportunity.

The old BotM also required you to get into the fray to heal during battle but yea VS was really about the not having repeat spam minnion healing...especially as they got older. You keep it up and then right before battle you top them off with BotM and/or HA.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

Starting from the old version, if anything, you'd want to address the cast time or energy cost to make it less efficient.

Why does it need to be less efficient, honestly? I also think Carinae suggested it just to appeas A.net some because I'm sure he'd be fine with just having VS back to what it was.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

I like Rot and Swarm on death guys, they serve the same functionality in low minion situations. I'm also a fan of Taste of Death - especially with the Golem - though it's hardly essential. Toss in a couple minion skills and BotM, and your res. Plus you have a secondary, and other attributes, that you can play with since you have the points. You really don't have such a barren bar that you're going to throw on random crap like Verata's, the skill needs to actually do something to justify being there. It's just that you do have space for good skills if they happen to come along, you don't have to sacrifice core functionality (which in my mind is just Fiend + BotM) to get it on there.

I like the self protection as apposed to more damage or life steal as I'm more of a prevent the damage in the first place kinda guy. I also felt that the extra damage provided by Rot/Swarm in a PvE situation really wasn't all that needed with 50ish minnioins up...granted now with 10 that extra damage would make a difference and I haven't tried out the skills since. With a minnion window I would be all for ToD but without the ability to accurately choose which minnion to consume and the difficutly with Death Nova I'd rather just stick with HA for self healing. Anywhere where 120-130 life can't save me, 420(I think?) probably won't either...and your giving up on damage and a body.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

The value of the minions is not simply in that raw 160 DPS. It's that it's coming from a character that provides more defense to a team than a monk. All the damage that would otherwise go onto players goes onto expendable minions that are getting *incredibly* efficient heals from BotM instead.

That was pretty much my point. Over all MM is still very useful.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

I honestly don't understand this whole 'skill of the MM' argument. The character never took any appreciable amount of skill. I guess there were some competitions between MMs over who could get a bigger army through microing Heal Area and BotM, but who cares? You'd get 30-40 without even really trying, and an army of that size didn't even need a team to complete just about anything without even trying. I'd rather blow things up quickly and finish my objectives faster than try and micro another dozen meaningless minions into the horde.

In a game of button mashing, time and energy management with some situational responses are about the only challenge. What's harder...bonder monk with a keg warrior or active protect without the keg warrior. That's really all it is. I only argued over the sub class because people were posting things I felt were loads of crap. And to assume I'd sit there trying to raise that one last minnion up instead of moving on to the next battle is wrong. Carrying 50ish minnions provided some application of time, energy and situation management and hence made it enjoyable for me. Now all we do is spam BotM...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

What does bumping the minion cap another six have to do with anything? Oh, they could give us minion control...or, hell, why don't you just give the most powerful class another hundred DPS and we'll call it a deal.

What's the point of having it at 10? You gonna tell me that isn't arbitrary...that A.net researched all the differect number combonations to see what would be the best choice...or did they just pick a nice round number? But really I'm fine with 10 but like I said give us more control, even if it has to be some form of spell to get minnions to target a single enemy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

Well, they could give elementalists the ability to target the ground with their spells...

You see any reason not too? I've always found it kinda stupid you have to AoE an enemy instead of a target location...

Ensign · Jun 04, 2006, 10:08 AM // 10:08

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

The old BotM also required you to get into the fray to heal during battle but yea VS was really about the not having repeat spam minnion healing...especially as they got older.

Substitute old for new in that quote, I made a brain fart. Old Blood of the Master was basically useless. If I remember right, it was just plain worse than a 9-spec Heal Area. Also, the need for such skills was diminished by the size of the hordes - they rolled over things so quickly that minions never took appreciable amounts of damage. Now they do.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

Why does it need to be less efficient, honestly?

It doesn't, as I said, but if for whatever reason the skill needed a nerf you'd want to affect that efficiency. Adding random conditions that either don't matter (easily interrupted) or crush the skill entirely aren't going to get you where you want. Verata's Sacrifice always had an easy to understand, solid effect, there has never been a reason to make it needlessly complicated.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

I also felt that the extra damage provided by Rot/Swarm in a PvE situation really wasn't all that needed with 50ish minnioins up...granted now with 10 that extra damage would make a difference and I haven't tried out the skills since.

Swarm is easy to pass on, you have to spam it to really get milage and that only happens in disaster time when you don't have any minions. Rot on the other hand is awesome. You're looking at 208 damage over its lifespan to each target it infects, and it's not terribly difficult to get an entire mob with that one cast. It rarely bounces back in PvE, making it so attractive it hurts. I like having at least one skill to toss out there at the beginning of the fight as well, not only does it make things go faster, but it doesn't even cost you anything because you're going to get the energy back on the first kill.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

With a minnion window I would be all for ToD but without the ability to accurately choose which minnion to consume and the difficutly with Death Nova I'd rather just stick with HA for self healing. Anywhere where 120-130 life can't save me, 420(I think?) probably won't either...and your giving up on damage and a body.

Taste is an awesome panic button, especially with a golem (that you can keep targeted for the most part) - Taste won't even kill it if it's near full, and even if it does you don't care because you get it right back. It's a convenient skill to have for resetting your golem as well, as golems tend to actually live long enough to get old and hit that permanent -10 degen. I'll use it to pick out horrors or other startup minions to replace with fiends - being able to selectively kill minions has become much more useful with the cap. It's hardly essential, but the combination of ultimate emergency heal plus the tricks you can pull with it give it a place on a bar that isn't pressed for space.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

What's the point of having it at 10? You gonna tell me that isn't arbitrary...that A.net researched all the differect number combonations to see what would be the best choice...or did they just pick a nice round number?

They very likely did do some research into where the character starts to become insane, and implemented the cap where it is in order to get a good, round, scaling set of numbers that landed close to that boundary.

I'm not going to sit here and say that 10 is the perfect, balanced number for minions (though in fairness it is likely what I would have chosen as well). What I will say is given that the cap exists where it is, arguments for changing the cap need to carry their own reasoning. There very well may be good arguments for giving a MM more minions, but arguments that make no sense, or come down to 'the minion cap should be higher because I want more minions' aren't terribly productive.

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Originally Posted by Manic Smile

You see any reason not too? I've always found it kinda stupid you have to AoE an enemy instead of a target location...

It doesn't exist due to engine constraints. I'm sure they have enough talent coding the game that they could change it if they wanted to, but that just hasn't been something they desired to do apparently.

My point was not about whether or not such a feature would be a good idea, but the flimsy logic of asking for a very blatant power buff if a feature can't be implemented.

Peace,
-CxE

Manic Smile · Jun 04, 2006, 12:05 PM // 12:05

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Originally Posted by Ensign

It doesn't, as I said, but if for whatever reason the skill needed a nerf you'd want to affect that efficiency. Adding random conditions that either don't matter (easily interrupted) or crush the skill entirely aren't going to get you where you want. Verata's Sacrifice always had an easy to understand, solid effect, there has never been a reason to make it needlessly complicated.

The reasoning behind Carinae's suggestion if I understand it right is that, he as do I believe, that A.net nerfed VS soley for it's believed impact on pvp battle situations...most likely ABs. Perhaps were wrong but I dont' think A.net cares if we use VS to coast a group of minnions around a whole PvE map...we can do that now with BotM, granted there is more hassel but it's still the same effect over all. The bing impact I think would be to cast VS prior to a battle, regen your mana till only a bit of VS is left, then go into battle with both VS and BotM...two 'army' effecting spells. I feel BotM needed that buff as it was pretty sad to have a healing line be of more benefit to my minnions then the purposely crafted death spell but A.net needed to prevent VS from being effective in battle without making the skill useless...or less useful...in the situation where we most need it, minnion transportation/down time. I just don't see the need to alter the cast time or the mana cost if we can directly alter it's combat effectiveness. Perhaps easily interuptable woudln't pan out in real play but I think Carinae has the right idea. *edit* how about adding in for the duration of this spell minnions do 3/4th damage or something of that nature.

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Originally Posted by Ensign

Taste is an awesome panic button, especially with a golem (that you can keep targeted for the most part) - Taste won't even kill it if it's near full, and even if it does you don't care because you get it right back. It's a convenient skill to have for resetting your golem as well, as golems tend to actually live long enough to get old and hit that permanent -10 degen. I'll use it to pick out horrors or other startup minions to replace with fiends - being able to selectively kill minions has become much more useful with the cap. It's hardly essential, but the combination of ultimate emergency heal plus the tricks you can pull with it give it a place on a bar that isn't pressed for space.

ToD is useful for Golem but I have no idea why A.net made it so that the golem doesn't leave a corpse when you recast it before it dies? This would remove the need all together? I find Dark Bond in conjunction with HA prevent my need to worry for the most part...encht remove aside. Being able to selectively choose a minnion for ToD is most needed where it is most difficult to actually do...in battle.

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Originally Posted by Ensign

They very likely did do some research into where the character starts to become insane, and implemented the cap where it is in order to get a good, round, scaling set of numbers that landed close to that boundary.

I'm not going to sit here and say that 10 is the perfect, balanced number for minions (though in fairness it is likely what I would have chosen as well). What I will say is given that the cap exists where it is, arguments for changing the cap need to carry their own reasoning. There very well may be good arguments for giving a MM more minions, but arguments that make no sense, or come down to 'the minion cap should be higher because I want more minions' aren't terribly productive.

Not that I disbelieve you but I know you are skilled at crunching the numbers and I'd love to see some kind of imperical test...even if it has to be extrapolated...on minnion number vs single target dps.

I like the idea of 16 solely because it's one for each lvl of death but that's purely an OCD thing. 10 is fine by me but it still seems kind arbitrary. Is 11 gonna be so much more? 12? Where does one more minnion break an apposing army?

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Originally Posted by Ensign

It doesn't exist due to engine constraints. I'm sure they have enough talent coding the game that they could change it if they wanted to, but that just hasn't been something they desired to do apparently.

I would pay for this kinda thing, and some minnion control, Hench AI/Customization, improved trade system, reconnect options, improved storage system before I'd pay for another chapter. I mean really I'm gonna pay 20 bucks to buy more slots...I'd pay another 20 to be able to use a tradeing post of some kind. Smarter > Harder.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

My point was not about whether or not such a feature would be a good idea, but the flimsy logic of asking for a very blatant power buff if a feature can't be implemented.

Peace,
-CxE

It's not about wanting the power back. It's about wanting to know what the hell they were thinking when they chose to nerf the MM build the way the did. I just want some kind of logic I can understand...and if they can't provide it I want something done...even if it is just putting VS back...I MISS that skill.

lord of shadow · Jun 04, 2006, 01:03 PM // 13:03

how about veretas being restored to the old functionality.. but with the restriction fo the old blood of the master? (only affects minions next to you)
this means we all get our lovely coasting skill but it cant be used during battles with much effect and therefore is much more balanced than it was.

Carinae · Jun 04, 2006, 02:42 PM // 14:42

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Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

Restore Verata's Sacrifice to its previous functionality, but make it easily interruptable.

I meant interruptable per minion, similar to Healing Spring.

EDIT: and, yes, I suggested the interruptability to appease the Anet gods.

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Originally Posted by Ensign

I honestly don't understand this whole 'skill of the MM' argument. The character never took any appreciable amount of skill. I guess there were some competitions between MMs over who could get a bigger army through microing Heal Area and BotM, but who cares? You'd get 30-40 without even really trying, and an army of that size didn't even need a team to complete just about anything without even trying. I'd rather blow things up quickly and finish my objectives faster than try and micro another dozen meaningless minions into the horde.

Well, that's just great. How many endless debates were there about Cleave/Eviscerate or Healing comparisons? Good Warriors can try to eek out that last 2dps, but not MM's? It's not Orders were running. (and to be fair, I'd accept not all Orders Necros are equal)

So unless we are dealing the damage directly, or individually selling minions/party to heal it's a skillless build? I don't believe that you believe that, and if you do, then all MMs might as well download a bot and hit 'autopilot'.

We're in the line of fire the way monks are, have to deal with energy/time management like elementalists and must respond tactically like a warrior (ie: defend the casters)

A good monk is one who isn't noticed, same with MMs. And like monks, we catch hell if something goes wrong.

The tone of that paragraph (and maybe I'm wrong here) is exactly what got us nerfed in the first place. The perception that MMs are super-powerful and simultaneously skillless. Last week I suggested that there be no minion cap, just increase the difficulty of the build. Seperate the wheat from the chaff. Set a goal of average MMs having 10 minions, while ones that knew what they were doing (or those who bothered to go the extra mile) could reach 30ish.

You didn't like that either. I just can't win for losing.

Ensign · Jun 04, 2006, 09:13 PM // 21:13

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Originally Posted by Manic Smile

The reasoning behind Carinae's suggestion if I understand it right is that, he as do I believe, that A.net nerfed VS soley for it's believed impact on pvp battle situations...most likely ABs.

Yeah, I can see that argument but I really can't accept it. If anything the minion cap took care of that, much the same way that it took care of ridiculous PvE necros.

My gut feeling is that VS got nerfed as hard as it did because they wanted Blood of the Master to be the minion heal of choice - since it was going to be a core skill, and they didn't want to have to make a new minion heal for every chapter. So they put that where it needed to be, and I guess were unhappy with the results of new BotM plus Verata's on the same bar. So Verata's got hammered. I wouldn't know how bad the combination was, I never got to play with it - but the nerf to Verata's seems a *little* over the top.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

regen your mana till only a bit of VS is left, then go into battle with both VS and BotM...two 'army' effecting spells.

Yeah that's the deal. I still have to wonder about the change, though - as far as I can remember, this is the first time in the history of the retail game that a skill has been nerfed into uselessness, for reasons other than it being used in some exploitative build.

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Originally Posted by Manic Smile

ToD is useful for Golem but I have no idea why A.net made it so that the golem doesn't leave a corpse when you recast it before it dies?

I really don't know. It does leave a corpse if it dies due to the minion cap as well, which is kinda weird. Maybe it just ended up working that way code-wise and they decided to leave it? I have trouble imagining them going 'oh, the Flesh Golem leaves a corpse when you re-summon it, that's too good'. But they also gave us that condition on Unyielding Aura as well so who knows.

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Originally Posted by Manic Smile

Not that I disbelieve you but I know you are skilled at crunching the numbers and I'd love to see some kind of imperical test...even if it has to be extrapolated...on minnion number vs single target dps.

The single target DPS is just going to be number of minions times the damage per minion, no? Of course that will be spread around once things get chaotic but I honestly odn't worry too much about that.

The raw numbers are roughly 16 DPS per Fiend, 14 from the Golem, 9 per Horror, and 3.5 per Minion, at 16 death, vs. 60 AL. You can thank an old buddy of mine, Pharalon, for running the empirical tests on that.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

I like the idea of 16 solely because it's one for each lvl of death but that's purely an OCD thing. 10 is fine by me but it still seems kind arbitrary. Is 11 gonna be so much more? 12? Where does one more minnion break an apposing army?

16 would give you 0 minions at 0 death, which isn't acceptable when you give a minion skill to level 1 characters in pre-sear, and when there's an expectation of your skills working at any attribute level unless it says otherwise. Animate Bone Minions gives two minions, so the minimum number at 0 needs to be 2. If you add one per level after that, you get 18 at 16 death. I think from past experience, and from seeing how strong 10 minions is, that 18 is arbitrarily close to wrecking ball levels. Next best is 2 + attribute/2, or 10. The character is still extremely strong at that level but doesn't overrun things, so they probably stopped tweaking at that point. Is 12 a better number? How about 8? Who knows, things generally aren't balanced that finely. 10 is acceptable, and it's the best elegant number, so it stuck.

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Originally Posted by Manic Smile

even if it is just putting VS back...I MISS that skill.

Agreed. Even if the skill was really strong, it took a significant hit just from the minion cap - 10 minions regenerating is weaker than 40 - and it going away made playing the class more tedious - not harder. After 10 minutes or so of playing the template I kinda unconsciously get into a rhythm of hitting BotM all the time, but really, that isn't exactly exciting gameplay. What I think hurt was having to adjust to the minion cap, while at the same time eating the nerf to VS that made maintaining the new, smaller number of minions much more tedious.

Minion cap plus BotM buff gives you less minions that are easier to maintain, which is a clear gameplay change that I wouldn't mind adjusting to. Minion cap plus a bigger pain to maintain? That just seems to be overdoing it.

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Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

Well, that's just great. How many endless debates were there about Cleave/Eviscerate or Healing comparisons? Good Warriors can try to eek out that last 2dps, but not MM's?

The thing that had the biggest effect on MM DPS was not the number of minions but the time spent running between mobs. From my experience, both playing with and as a death necro, is that effort spent keeping minions at -10 pips up only served to slow the group down. Now maybe you were an uber minion player, who managed to maintain 90 minions while never slowing down the group to get those extra 50. I'm open to that possibility. But the relevant gameplay concern to me was always speed. Everyone else on the team moved faster, and the concern wasn't whether a horde had 40 or 60 guys in it, but how soon it would show up and blow up a mob in less than 10 seconds - then how much time would be spent, and lost, while the minion master raised more guys from those corpses.

Animate Bone Horror was a key part of a minion build, because those corpses on the ground at the end of a battle are not worth 8 seconds of your time. After a point, they stop being worth the 3 second cast time of Horror as well. I'd rather just slam my horde into the next pack 4 seconds sooner than add another meaningless horror. I would rather get to the next mob 6-7 seconds sooner, than kill it half a second faster once I'm there. That math seemed obvious to me. I would cap out around 30-40 dudes while running at maximum speed, and that had a negligible, if any, effect on my killing power.

Again, maybe you were such an awesome minion army builder that you could maintain close to a hundred guys without sacrificing any speed. I never saw that, usually the people who obsessed over their minion armies were slow as hell. If you really were that good, I would hope that you would be willing to write yourself off as an exception that can't be used for balance judgements. PvE, unlike PvP, gets balanced around standard expected output of characters, not what a very narrow subset of the population can do.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

So unless we are dealing the damage directly, or individually selling minions/party to heal it's a skillless build?

It's not like I've never played the build. Maintaining moderate (30-40) armies of minions, that absolutely wrecked everything, was one of the most mindless things I've done in GW PvE. You got into a Verata's rhythm, aimed a BotM / Heal Area in combat, and just demolished everything. I'm sure things got more interesting if you tried to maximize the armies and keep every guy alive, but again, I don't feel that was optimal gameplay at all. The only thing that compared in simplicity was maintaining seven enchantments on a stance tank with a gear. That could put me to sleep with a quickness.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

We're in the line of fire the way monks are, have to deal with energy/time management like elementalists and must respond tactically like a warrior (ie: defend the casters)

Are we talking about PvP, or PvE here? In PvP I agree with this to an extent, but in PvE these don't seem relevant. In the line of fire? Stop being a nub and get out of aggro range. Energy management isn't relevant, at least, not in the way an elementalist deals with it - your job is to spend energy as fast as possible in combat to avoid wasting all the Soul Reaping triggers that are coming your way. The only time energy becomes relevant is after combat when the Soul Reaping stops, and you're trying to clear out the corpses quickly. Of course, you know my response to that - screw the corpses, get to the next mob.

Responding tactically to defend the casters seems like a bit of a paradox. What do you intend to defend the casters with? Minion AI seems to be established as the limiting factor of your effectiveness - either they get the job done, or they don't. Not a lot of skill involved there. Are you planning on wanding targets to death or something? I would say that reminding your softies to kite through a fiend wall would be the best possible defensive contribution. The only limit to how good you can be at that is your typing speed.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

The tone of that paragraph (and maybe I'm wrong here) is exactly what got us nerfed in the first place. The perception that MMs are super-powerful and simultaneously skillless.

I believe you were living in an alternate universe if you didn't recognize that, in PvE, minion masters were retardedly overpowered and required very little from their players.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

Last week I suggested that there be no minion cap, just increase the difficulty of the build...You didn't like that either. I just can't win for losing.

We covered that. None of the minion maintenence skills could outperform Heal Area if you wanted to go in that direction. On top of that, the natural durability of minions would have to go through the floor. In large swaths of the game it isn't terribly difficult to stay around 10 minions *without even healing them*. I feel that the hit to durability alongside the neutering of all effective maintenence skills, in order to achieve the effects of the minion cap, would make the profession more tedious than the current BotM spam, and making is frustrating at the same time.

Instead of feeling like a powerful character limited by the minion cap, you're going to have to feel like a total gimp, struggling to keep flimsy minions together. I think the current solution of adding a minion cap, but allowing those minions to be rather busty and easy to maintain, is a much healthier and fun solution.

Peace,
-CxE

Manic Smile · Jun 04, 2006, 10:54 PM // 22:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

Well, that's just great. How many endless debates were there about Cleave/Eviscerate or Healing comparisons? Good Warriors can try to eek out that last 2dps, but not MM's?

I've gotten this feeling before. Any necro sub class is fine for a MM but god forbid I should want to run a hammer warrior because everyone knows axe has the greatest DPS. But if I want to debat MM subs I'm being pretentious and should just shut up.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

So unless we are dealing the damage directly, or individually selling minions/party to heal it's a skillless build? I don't believe that you believe that, and if you do, then all MMs might as well download a bot and hit 'autopilot'.

Honestly, people's opinion of an MM would change if there was a way to play it in PvP beyond MF. I'm quite sure that's why some skills/builds/classes are so respected/disected/loved as apposed to others. Warriros being the main source of DPS right now for PvP/GvG...you get the idea.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carinae Dragonblood

The tone of that paragraph (and maybe I'm wrong here) is exactly what got us nerfed in the first place. The perception that MMs are super-powerful and simultaneously skillless. Last week I suggested that there be no minion cap, just increase the difficulty of the build. Seperate the wheat from the chaff. Set a goal of average MMs having 10 minions, while ones that knew what they were doing (or those who bothered to go the extra mile) could reach 30ish.

I agree it is singularly fustrating to have the build I enjoy playing be changed into something that is purely button mashing...others can argue that it alwasy was but no more so then a good warrior build or a good monk build. There was still lost of skill involved...now with BotM is't much more like the bonder build I've mentioned before.

Manic Smile · Jun 05, 2006, 12:01 AM // 00:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

Yeah, I can see that argument but I really can't accept it. If anything the minion cap took care of that, much the same way that it took care of ridiculous PvE necros.

Neither I nor Carinae understand why A.net did it either. If we could we wouldn't be complaining about the nerf.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

Yeah that's the deal. I still have to wonder about the change, though - as far as I can remember, this is the first time in the history of the retail game that a skill has been nerfed into uselessness, for reasons other than it being used in some exploitative build.

It's like Carinae said before, it seems A.net rushed the choice.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

I really don't know. It does leave a corpse if it dies due to the minion cap as well, which is kinda weird. Maybe it just ended up working that way code-wise and they decided to leave it? I have trouble imagining them going 'oh, the Flesh Golem leaves a corpse when you re-summon it, that's too good'. But they also gave us that condition on Unyielding Aura as well so who knows.

You're likely right but it makes using Golem, quite tendious sometimes. And the worse part is I don't think we can expect to see it changed with the list of other much bigger problems that need to be addressed as well as Ch. 3.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

The single target DPS is just going to be number of minions times the damage per minion, no? Of course that will be spread around once things get chaotic but I honestly odn't worry too much about that.

That's just my point, some probability on one versus group size versus minnion size but tbh if I thought it was worth the effort I'd do it myself.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

The raw numbers are roughly 16 DPS per Fiend, 14 from the Golem, 9 per Horror, and 3.5 per Minion, at 16 death, vs. 60 AL. You can thank an old buddy of mine, Pharalon, for running the empirical tests on that.

Is there a whole link/thread on this? If so, can you point me in the direction, I'd like to read more.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

16 would give you 0 minions at 0 death, which isn't acceptable when you give a minion skill to level 1 characters in pre-sear, and when there's an expectation of your skills working at any attribute level unless it says otherwise. Animate Bone Minions gives two minions, so the minimum number at 0 needs to be 2. If you add one per level after that, you get 18 at 16 death. I think from past experience, and from seeing how strong 10 minions is, that 18 is arbitrarily close to wrecking ball levels. Next best is 2 + attribute/2, or 10. The character is still extremely strong at that level but doesn't overrun things, so they probably stopped tweaking at that point. Is 12 a better number? How about 8? Who knows, things generally aren't balanced that finely. 10 is acceptable, and it's the best elegant number, so it stuck.

I wish there was a way to try all this out, hindsight and all that, if I knew how there were gonna nerf the MM, I would have tried all the different minnion numbers just so I could say for myself the difference between say 10 and 16/18 or 30+.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

Even if the skill was really strong, it took a significant hit just from the minion cap - 10 minions regenerating is weaker than 40 - and it going away made playing the class more tedious - not harder. After 10 minutes or so of playing the template I kinda unconsciously get into a rhythm of hitting BotM all the time, but really, that isn't exactly exciting gameplay.

...

Minion cap plus BotM buff gives you less minions that are easier to maintain, which is a clear gameplay change that I wouldn't mind adjusting to. Minion cap plus a bigger pain to maintain? That just seems to be overdoing it.

yep

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

The thing that had the biggest effect on MM DPS was not the number of minions but the time spent running between mobs. From my experience, both playing with and as a death necro, is that effort spent keeping minions at -10 pips up only served to slow the group down. Now maybe you were an uber minion player, who managed to maintain 90 minions while never slowing down the group to get those extra 50. I'm open to that possibility. But the relevant gameplay concern to me was always speed. Everyone else on the team moved faster, and the concern wasn't whether a horde had 40 or 60 guys in it, but how soon it would show up and blow up a mob in less than 10 seconds - then how much time would be spent, and lost, while the minion master raised more guys from those corpses.

This really is only a concern on the first mob or so when you are first building up the steam roller. Once you have 30ish, i ono, minnions you don't pick up every corpse before you move on to the next mob. You summon as they die and then move on. You might arrive 10 seconds after the warrior to the next mob because you were raising a last corpse and the delay in the travel as you heal your army but you didn't need to be grabbig aggro anyway. Rarely did the rest of the party drop even the first enemy of the next mob before my army arrived to help out. 90 is as intended a bit extreme in this reguard but 50 was not.

To give cases I've duoed Thirsty, there are time limits there and AoE mobs...things that I would think require skill. I think I could almost solo it cept rockshoot are the most annoying %^&* in numbers. Or Raisu Palace, another mission with a time limit I gotten master at 17min and some with henches and a MM. That's with only 10 minnions and I must not have stopped too much.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

Animate Bone Horror was a key part of a minion build, because those corpses on the ground at the end of a battle are not worth 8 seconds of your time. After a point, they stop being worth the 3 second cast time of Horror as well. I'd rather just slam my horde into the next pack 4 seconds sooner than add another meaningless horror. I would rather get to the next mob 6-7 seconds sooner, than kill it half a second faster once I'm there. That math seemed obvious to me. I would cap out around 30-40 dudes while running at maximum speed, and that had a negligible, if any, effect on my killing power.

Agreed but we are not argueing that. There was rarely much delat at all between mobs...the biggist slow down was rechasting VS/BotM then HA during transit. With MM i never felt faster recharge to be all that useful as even if the raise skills were back up I'd have to worry about my energy costs. Not having it helped steady out the rythm in reguards to VS and mana consumption anyway. So with either 30% fast cast or 40% fast cast%(weapon value) minnions would sometimes even insta cast...now with bloodstained finally working summoning in general is pretty quick. The trick was to keep your army alive with well placed HAs and up close BotMs(think front lines) while keeping VS up at all times and trying to keep a rythm to mana intake through SR. The idea is to keep enough minnions alive so that as you add minnions 'during battle' you come out the other end with more then you entered. I might leave 3 or 4 corpses behind after a battle in order to move on to the next but I raised 3 more then the 2 I lost during it. There was no more down time then a monk might need...that is none on a small to decent battle and more when the battle gets extended and my energy starts to run down preventing me from casting BotM/HA as much.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

Again, maybe you were such an awesome minion army builder that you could maintain close to a hundred guys without sacrificing any speed. I never saw that, usually the people who obsessed over their minion armies were slow as hell. If you really were that good, I would hope that you would be willing to write yourself off as an exception that can't be used for balance judgements. PvE, unlike PvP, gets balanced around standard expected output of characters, not what a very narrow subset of the population can do.

Most non /mo classes would drive me crazy with that kinda thing and then we'd get the /mo ones that were using it all el cookie cutter. But there were good MMs out there I've seen em...even some who were running /ele or /mez. That first 20-30 might take a while but after that if the mobs are close enough and the party does enough damage, say an SS or a Ele or so and eventually your moving through areas with 50, 60, I ono, large armies that keep getting bigger without having to stop because fewer minnions die. As long as your the time between mobs stay the same and the mobs size/difficulty stay the same then the army would keep growing to some point that I've never really researched. Less down time and closer mobs resulting in bigger armies.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

It's not like I've never played the build. Maintaining moderate (30-40) armies of minions, that absolutely wrecked everything, was one of the most mindless things I've done in GW PvE. You got into a Verata's rhythm, aimed a BotM / Heal Area in combat, and just demolished everything. I'm sure things got more interesting if you tried to maximize the armies and keep every guy alive, but again, I don't feel that was optimal gameplay at all. The only thing that compared in simplicity was maintaining seven enchantments on a stance tank with a gear. That could put me to sleep with a quickness.

I don't think either of us are claiming this. And granted you know much more about playing a MM then I would about playing a PvP warrior but playing PvE MM is what I did for almost over a year now. And the only time I've ever felt this was like a bonder monk is since the nerf. BotM spam ftl...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

Are we talking about PvP, or PvE here? In PvP I agree with this to an extent, but in PvE these don't seem relevant. In the line of fire? Stop being a nub and get out of aggro range. Energy management isn't relevant, at least, not in the way an elementalist deals with it - your job is to spend energy as fast as possible in combat to avoid wasting all the Soul Reaping triggers that are coming your way. The only time energy becomes relevant is after combat when the Soul Reaping stops, and you're trying to clear out the corpses quickly. Of course, you know my response to that - screw the corpses, get to the next mob.

Either, though you wouldn't catch me trying Halls. You have a wall of boddies that can fill a gap, absorb damage, do damage, HA to help heal, br sometimes. Sure a moderate MM can fuction by simply running to a mob at the begining and having all the minnions go wild. But perhaps the MM should wait further back and see that the mob split and the smaller is to the right and go that way to have more 30 on one minnion time. Or perhaps wait to see where the enemy mob would break through that warrior wall and pick up that one or 3 or more warriros runing though to gank the monks before attacking the whole mob. Or maybe the MM could just stand right next to another player as he is going to HA recover his life lost from the BotM he just did to his front ranks without giving the HA to the enemy attacking his ally. Sometimes being in aggro range is good...especially when I had Infuse and Dark Bond up...healing 5 minnions and only taking a hit or two before having it all refilled by HA? Is that a bad tactic? As for energy...there are constant fiends summon mostly, the ocasional Horror for a body or to keep the enemy off the fiends or as Fiends was just cast, VS, BotM and in my case protection spells. I also had a switch for rebirth as I have /mo and who else has free time/energy to rebirth in the middle of battle.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

Responding tactically to defend the casters seems like a bit of a paradox. What do you intend to defend the casters with? Minion AI seems to be established as the limiting factor of your effectiveness - either they get the job done, or they don't. Not a lot of skill involved there. Are you planning on wanding targets to death or something? I would say that reminding your softies to kite through a fiend wall would be the best possible defensive contribution. The only limit to how good you can be at that is your typing speed.

Most the parties I play with repeatedly know the drill, if we are serious, lately I've been reading more guru as I play then anything, will kite to my army but as I said above you just hold you army back a little longer. If there is only one war coming into aggro range as it trys to gank your casters I assure you the minnions can figgure out which guy to attack. And moving my army around to postition them into attacking the single mob I want, or it's area at least, without aggroing anything else first, with no real game skill for it does take player skill.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

I believe you were living in an alternate universe if you didn't recognize that, in PvE, minion masters were retardedly overpowered and required very little from their players.

That's not the claim I am making. But what about 55s(monk/ele/nec), solo warriors...really how hard is it to duo UW. Two guys versus EVERTHING...yea that's not overpowered at all. I mean really, Racthoh can go through a good part of FoW alone but that's fine... This was never about PvE...this was about PvP, most likely ABs as MF is still kinda a joke for the most part. So your telling me that PCs can't figure out how to take out one MM with a big army? There are so many ways to do this...and is having to have anti MM skills any more unresonable the having anti warrior skills. You don't have to run either but you know there will be warriors, so if you know there will be a MM do you whine about how it's gonna have a huge army or bring what you need to win? Imo it's more about how A.net handeled this nerf and the reasons they have for it then the idea itself. You need a heal monk, is it so unreasonable to need a MM. It seems more about maintaining some precieved status quo then any game unbalance. I would just like to hear Gaile Gray or someone from A.net give us a good why. Or alternatively give back VS.

And just to get it out there MM is kinda a waste in ABs anyway...just don't engage the MM. It's not about fighting it's about running around capping points. Sure a MM could hold a point but guess who's the real star of ABs... that's right the warrior with his high speed at the loss of no to very little dps output.

Ensign · Jun 05, 2006, 09:37 AM // 09:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

You're likely right but it makes using Golem, quite tendious sometimes. And the worse part is I don't think we can expect to see it changed with the list of other much bigger problems that need to be addressed as well as Ch. 3.

Eh, I only use the golem because I don't think there's a good elite to compliment fiend hordes. If they'd make something attractive in a future chapter that'd let me forget about golem entirely I would be very happy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

Is there a whole link/thread on this? If so, can you point me in the direction, I'd like to read more.

I have a spreadsheet of data sitting somewhere on my hard drive. I just remember the important results of the data - the DPS figures mentioned, as well as attack rates - a 1.75 second refire for fiends, 3 second refire for all the melee minions.

The glacial attack rate on all the melee minions makes it pretty easy to write them all off as your main minion, especially with all the other problems they have (terrible AI and body blocking each other, harder to Heal Area on, etc).

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

This really is only a concern on the first mob or so when you are first building up the steam roller. Once you have 30ish, i ono, minnions you don't pick up every corpse before you move on to the next mob. You summon as they die and then move on.

Yeah, and eventually you hit a wall when your minions are sitting at something like -20 degen and Verata's Sacrifice no longer does anything. That gives you realistic lifespans of around six minutes for a single minion - Verata's stopped working for keeping them up after three and change, and by minute five you're having to spam Heal Area / BotM to keep them up. It was those time constraints that capped you out on minions, 'useful corpse generation' and whatnot, before your minions hit the degen wall and just expired. Once you're steamrolling you pick up less corpses per pack in the interest of time, and you hit a sort of steady state on how many minions you have up - in my experience, somewhere in the 30s, maybe 40s depending on the zone.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

Or Raisu Palace, another mission with a time limit I gotten master at 17min and some with henches and a MM. That's with only 10 minnions and I must not have stopped too much.

Well now the need to stop is minimal because you cap your minions and just roll with it. Stopping to get that last corpse just to replace another minion really isn't a concern. The playstyle is pretty different now.

I hit Raisu with minions for the first time a couple nights ago, hit it at 20 and change with some bitterness and haven't really desired to go back and try for the masters...though I did have to slow down a bit to clean up Silver Armor deaths at one point.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

And the only time I've ever felt this was like a bonder monk is since the nerf. BotM spam ftl...

I think the difference is from Heal Area. Before you wanted to make good use of that skill for good heals mid-battle - getting your fiends to bunch up for Heal Area while attacking was huge, and it got you a lot of healing in transit. Now that tactic really isn't neccessary, so all the interesting Heal Area positioning became obsolete in favor of BotM spam.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

And moving my army around to postition them into attacking the single mob I want, or it's area at least, without aggroing anything else first, with no real game skill for it does take player skill.

Yeah that's a thing that crushes minions at times, their perfect willingness to fire into a rock over and over again, unwilling to break aggro until their target has died. Lost some nice armies back in the day to that. You really want to know where to engage from in certain areas to avoid those problems. Not the most difficult thing in the world, but experience certainly helps. =)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

That's not the claim I am making. But what about 55s(monk/ele/nec), solo warriors...really how hard is it to duo UW. Two guys versus EVERTHING...yea that's not overpowered at all. I mean really, Racthoh can go through a good part of FoW alone but that's fine...

The argument that because several things are broken you cannot fix any particular broken thing is irrational.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

So your telling me that PCs can't figure out how to take out one MM with a big army?

I'm telling you that I do not accept the basis for your argument and therefore there's no need to refute any particular part of it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

And just to get it out there MM is kinda a waste in ABs anyway...just don't engage the MM. It's not about fighting it's about running around capping points.

Alliance battles are about map control. Forcing your opponent to retreat from whatever position you happen to be in is a significant advantage, you get to push them around, capture and maintain points more easily. If they can't get near you without dying, their movement is clearly restricted, and that's a huge part of a game that's about moving around the map quickly, wouldn't you say?

Peace,
-CxE

Pharalon · Jun 05, 2006, 09:55 AM // 09:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manic Smile

Is there a whole link/thread on this? If so, can you point me in the direction, I'd like to read more.

Minion Data. All collected on the Isle vs 60Al dummies. Add to it if you feel the need.

Ensign · Jun 05, 2006, 08:01 PM // 20:01

Pharalon is a sneaky bastard. You won't see him for months at a time, but as soon as you mention his name, bam, there he is.

Thanks for sharing that data you crazy stalker you. =)

Peace,
-CxE

Carinae · Jun 06, 2006, 01:22 AM // 01:22

Interesting. FGs are only 2dps below Fiends, which is nothing, especially given the other functionallity they provide. So based on that, I'd have to say it looks like 1 FG + 9 Fiends is indeed the sweet spot for damage and utility.

VHorrors, on the other hand, have 4% less dps than regular Horrors. I'm guessing that's a stastical anomaly, but it's unexpected still.