Galaxy Brain

Looking into the upgrade powers, we have the following: Cast times are between 1-2.3 seconds, this could be standardized (weird how they're not... beasts have like 1 second and Demons have >2s on each upgrade) Both upgrade powers cost 22.75 end (yikes) T1 recharges in 6s, T2 in 10s Range of 50ft, 30ft radius around target That has some wiggle room for additional benefits. As for personal attacks, one thing to look at is how much do we expect the MM to contribute with DPS? For example, the propositions will make each tier of pet roughly even in damage contribution (30% on minions, then >30% each on the LTs and Boss). Should the MM be = a pet tier? A portion?

They have the same problem. MMs have increased end costs on all powers for relatively less output.

The damage scales are correct, it's just the output does get tweaked afterwards for many sets/powers/ATs

Masterminds also have a 20% higher endurance multiplier that no other AT has, and is seperate to the damage formula aside from boosting the resulting end cost.

Now, if we didnt have as harsh a penalty to end when actually using the attacks....

Moreso just throwing out ideas at the wall. Something talked about today in the MM discord is that at higher level MM gameplay can potentially get a bit boring depending on the sets as there is little to do with the pets themselves, or as the MM. Having more actions to perform in the primary could help with this, and the upgrades seem like a good spot.

@Nanolathe, @Redlynne, @Nowea, I think we have a cool wavelength picked up here in regards to the upgrade powers themselves. If possible to make owning the power simply grant the upgrades on summon, perhaps the actual upgrade powers could do something new when used? Could be a heal, defense boost, an attack around the targeted pet, just something.... I also like the idea behind a morale boost while attacking. I think many of us were focused on the attacks providing debuffs, that the idea of them providing group buffs kind of went under the radar!

That'd make 3 primaries that just have leadership as their bread and butter, or at least the equivalent with the Howls that beasts can give each other. With Thugs already having straight-up leadership, I'd rather have each primary still have unique attributes like the Field Specialist and Spec Ops changes providing layered defenses for the set.

I claim Amp Up

They all average to about 1/3 per tier actually (except Grave Knights which contribute 65% omg). But having them be so fragile means you lose out on 1/3rd of your damage 😞

MMs predate IO's by a few issues at least, and the unique aura IO's by at least 7 whole issues. I think it is safe to say the IOs were designed with MMs in mind, and not the other way around. @Nanolathe, I'm interested in your take. The pets are essentially the highlight of what makes MMs "click" for players (petless builds aside), so I think they should naturally be the meat of all them design wise. Can you expand on what you meant by this approach being backwards, and your thoughts on the upgrade powers?

Comparing the sets when researching, Ninja damage potential blows mercs way, way out of the park to the point of them being solidly better imo. In their thread the major change is to simply not have them be tissue paper (though still squishier!) To allow the damage to be used more often 🙂

@Redlynne, either way you slice it the pets still have survival problems without those auras, and as mentioned here and elsewhere where the upgrades and attacks are often just dead weight and could be used to help in this regard. Slotting the IOs into them help, but at the end of the day you still need 6 of them for a total package + more power picks. If adding survival to the primaries was done via (upgrades), that in turn would require changing the IO auras as they would then stack. We opted to go for broke and just had the aura effects combined into the upgrades and swap out the aura effects for new unique ones, such as procs on pet attacks or a new supremacy aura that can help team mates and pets alike. Personally, given how a chunk of the auras are cloned effects I think replacing them with unique ones would overall help slotting diversity depending on the pet and the effect. For example, the Lethal DoT proc suggested vs the -Damage proc could have different applications depending on which pet / primary, where before it didn't really matter as long as you slapped the aura in one of em. Any method we pursue, even the simplest one of allowing them to be slotted in other powers, carrys pros and cons. I'd rather opt to make them less mandatory and ensure MM pets can more reliably keep pets alive naturally first, and worry about the IOs later though.

Itd definitely need some field testing 😉

Unless you are a Controller, Dom, decent portion of MMs, Defenders or Corruptors. Like I showed earlier, those ATs have a good chunk of options that require >100% recharge to become perma, and if it is doable people will shoot for it. This skews the conversation on a global scale as other ATs generally dont have this problem.

I am 100% in favor of making more thematic self buffs, I've even made a similar thread that's buried somewhere! I do wish that the alternate power choices were viable for a case like this tho. For example, the player could choose between BU/Aim or a thematic variant that trades some of X for Y

I really dont want to be that guy, but in the same paragraph you talked down about making changes suited to the meta, and then a sentence later talked down about adding a new flavorful power. The OP also described the pool attacks getting considerable damage increases, so this along with say Spring Attack would get some healthy boosts.

Luckily the other points in the OP try to address issues like the purple patch, and there are individual threads links for the specific primaries. Aside from the IOs changing, what are your thoughts on allowing an MM to enter aggressive mode for self-offense (trading bodyguard to be more active), or the upgrade powers carrying inherent defenses to the pets to bridge the gap between the base and the IO auras? The latter is why we provided alternative IOs given the upgrades grant defenses and stacking them all up would be a bit ridiculous, but at the same time they are somewhat needed if you want to play an MM at high level and we see that they go from being the 3rd most popular to being the LEAST at high level so there is definitely a problem with them at that point.

Should have been a bit more clear here, but the main intent is to help in situations where you'd need your pet un-stuck or to come back to you asap. They already do this if you move far enough away, so shortening it or turning it into a direct command would be helpful. The unique IO's that are not ATO's would still be applicable to non-MM pets for those who wish to use them. Polling discord and in-game we found that very few non-MM players bother with the defense auras, which makes them a unique issue for MMs who get much, much more value from them (due to Henchmen and not Pet-tier... pets). What do you think about the proposed changes to the upgrade powers providing defenses to the pets in general? While allowing these IOs to be slotted into the primary attacks could work, part of the problem is that MM's essentially need all the auras for pets to have passable survival as they advance in levels. If this were attached to the upgrade powers in some way, this would make builds a bit more lenient overall and allow for the pet uniques to possibly become something more "unique". Ideally the change to Aggressive Mode should help make the primary attacks more valuable on top of this. Also, these are not wholesale rewrites of entire categories but rather the just what the unique IO's do.

Necromancy For the full details of the Monos-Brain Overhaul, please view the link below: Monos King & Galaxy Brains Mastermind Changes Necromancy has always been a popular thematic MM choice, but suffers a weakness in AoE damage, certain thematic inclusions, and the spirit of being a true undead master. The changes proposed in this thread will address these through: Increasing AoE Damage Situationally and Directly Modifying Inherent Resistances Grander Scale of Summoning General Necro Changes Soul Extraction | Recharge lowered to 200s from 600s. | Endurance cost raised From 13 to 20 | 1.10 Second Interrupt Time | You may now target defeated enemies. This is the first major change for necromancy, leaning hard on the "Summoning the dead" side of the set where as you progress through an encounter you amass an actual army of the undead! The extremely reduced recharge allows you to have multiple ghosts out at once with ease, especially combined with the ability to target not only your own dead Zombies (that seems like an oxymoron...), but defeated enemies along the way with the same system: Minions and below summon a Spirit, LTs and Snipers a Tortured Soul, and Bosses and above a Wraith. The unleashed spectres will continue to be controllable like ordinary Henchmen, or can be let rampant via aggressive setting to attack various enemies in AoE fashion. This is coupled with a rather large increase in Endurance cost. Sure, you can summon multiple ghosts to fight with your Zombie Horde... but at what cost? It isn't easy to control a zombie legion in tandem with extracting a soul, resulting in an minor, but interruptable cast time. The interruptable endurance charge can be managed back down in Aggressive Mode (see linked post) at the risk of being hit hard, with slotting, or other means, but is still a major hit if you decide to constantly grow your forces. Lich Almost to the extent of raising spirits, the set is noteworthy for its Lich, known to be a former necromancer in its own right. But it is observed to become an arguably disappointing T3 pet given it is more of a limited controller than a heavy hitter. Its lacking damage and need to wait until the final upgrade to gain its one truly substantial debuff, Fearsome Stare, leaves the supposedly mighty summon hungry for more. In its current state, the Lich isn't quite the husk of itself it could be. Let's try to fix that. Lich Mod 1: New Attribute: Containment (Controller) Available from Default Equipment Simply put, the damage the Lich deals can be increased on targets that are under a control effect. This has several synergies within it's own set (Tentacles being the big one), but also with powers found in your Secondary and Epic sets, as well as with team mates. Lich Mod 2: Inherent Resistance 26% N/C/T > 30% N/C/T Resistance Available from Default Equipment The Lich is squishy, and being the powerhouse magic caster it should most certainly have higher supernatural and rare damage resistance compared to the rest of the pets. Lich Mod 3: Dark Blast > Petrifying Gaze Available from Default Equipment Moving this power over Dark Blast gives the set some more control right away, and while Dark Blast may be gone it will more than make up for it with it's other changes! Lich Mod 4: Torrent | Damage amped to match Dark Blast in an AoE (30.59 base at lvl 50), double the endurance cost Available from Default Equipment For example, turning Torrent into a proper AoE attack that also applies KD and -ToHit. The endurance cost is increased on the Lich, which will require some monitoring, but the output per endurance from this power after holding or immobilizing targets will boost the set's AoE potential up nicely. Lich Mod 5: Petrifying Gaze > Unleash Soul +New power that it activates at <25% hp. Detonates itself for powerful negative Energy damage in a 15ft PBAoE, destroying itself and applying a Mag 3 stun to anything that survives. This can use the animations from the Dominator /Dark Assault PBAoE. Base Damage: 114.4 at lvl 50 Target Cap: 16 Activation Time: 4s. Available from Dark Empowerment A new power designed to give Necro some burst AoE damage, this mini-nuke can change the course of a fight if it's going south by triggering the Lich to unleash it's inner darkness and wipe the field / stun everything in it's wake. Especially powerful after the Lich probably has sent out Tentacles, the self sacrifice helps to balance the shift in power that this new Lich brings to the table and can easily give breathing room (well, if they breathe?) to the rest of your horde to finish the fight as you re-summon. Not to mention, once it does, you have the option to bind his soul back onto the material plane. Ghastly indeed. Lich Mod 6: New Power: Soul Extraction, non-interruptable. Available from Enchant Undead Lastly, while the Lich gets a self-detonating nuke version of Heart of Darkness, it also gains a brand new power in it's final upgrade: Soul Extraction. Combined with the Extraction you yourself posess, these situational abilities will handily increase the damage potential of necro, and the Lich itself. Ghosts summoned by the Lich are bound to the Lich, and will perish along with it in combat. Aside from the inability to be interrupted, this is a 1:1 clone of the version you have access to: the same base ghost stats, recharge and endurance costs. The main difference being that they inherit the slotting given to your Lich, and it may not exactly prioritize summoning during a fight. But still, getting to 32 and being able to snowball into an undead army will be a sight to see! Grave Knights The vast majority of the set's DPS comes from the two Grave Knights. These two are in pristine condition, and require only the slightest of modifications. With the proposed changes they would be practically unchanged -- but with a thin bone tossed their way. Knight Mod 1: Disembowel +10% chance of 52.13 damage crit Available from Enchant Undead Just like with Head Splitter, giving Disembowel a small crit chance on occasion will simply help with burst damage and allow the Knights to finish enemies off quicker and move onto the next target. Knight Mod 2: Crit Enabled in PvP Available When Applies Necro damage falls short in PvP compared to the other classes, as its single target damage is actually weakened due to the cornerstone Knights not maintaining their chance to crit. The damage difference in single target damage is significant, as the Head Splitter loses its chance for 79.52 damage in a short burst and thus 10% of its average damage as a result. Doing heavily resisted lethal damage and being melee whilst targets leap and run about, this is quick to become a shortcoming of Necro in PvP. Knight Mod 3: Inherent Resistance 26% Toxic Resistance > 28% S/L Resistance, 10% Toxic Res 26% Psionic Resistance > 13% Psionic Resistance Available from Default Equipment The Grave Knights are meant to be exactly that: Knights arisen from their earthly graves. The idea that they would have a lower panel of resistances than ordinary zombies despite their experience and armor has always been an extremely silly occurence. Combined with the fact they are the ones taking all the damage for the undead legion, their weakness to common damage has been in need for a change. They are more sentient than zombies though, and should recieve lower psionic res as a consequence and minor trade-off. Ghosts (Spirit, Tortured Soul, Wraith) Spirit Mod 1: Inherent Resistance -20% Resistance to Energy Damage Coming with thematic additions to augment the performance and experience of Necromancy, the Extracted Pets will now be in line with existing Spirits, and have a moderate Energy vulnerability. It seems appropriate with the games descriptions of Ghosts, and is a small trade off for being able to summon many easily. Overall these changes to Necro keep the theme of having extra temporary pets as well as adding specifically Conditional AoE damage to the set to help keep it competitive. The new vulnerability on summoned Ghosts is a hit to their own survival, and will need to be buffed per each summoned (see linked post), but the sheer number you and the Lich can summon can more than make up for that.

Robotics For the full details of the Monos-Brain Overhaul, please view the link below: Monos King & Galaxy Brains Mastermind Changes Robotics is a great Mastermind set, and has always been in the running for one of the top picks for pets. However, this is really only true after level 32 with the journey to that point being akin to downloading CoH on dial-up back in the day. Bots suffers from downright atrocious single-target damage, far below any other primary, and with AoE dps that only barely edges by it's closest competitor: Thugs. It'd be one thing if they were on complete opposite ends where nobody came close to their AoE while having the worst ST, but that simply isn't the case. Just for comparison lets look at Bots vs Thugs, Demons and Beasts for ST DPS: Before factoring in -Regen, and without the global changes mentioned in the Global MM thread linked above, Bots base DPS (no enhancements) is at 57% the amount that Thugs can put out vs an Even-level enemy! Not to mention how much further other sets can pull ahead with their unique powers or inherent abilities. Lets compare Even-level base DPS as well, considering the output of their AoE attacks and factoring in the target caps: Bots still falls just short of Thugs at just over 99%. The other sets also fall within a much shallower margin than the gap we see with Bots as they are now. The gap between AoE and ST for the other sets in comparison to each other just does not compute with how far the divide is with the Bots, and they don't have a unique lvl 18 power to help with this either! Robotics are in need of some upgrades that address their early game, their ST damage, and also take a look at one of their most lack luster powers in Repair to make them into a true war-machine. The changes proposed in this thread will address these through: Increasing ST damage by utilizing the T1-T2 pets primarily, so the set is not so back-loaded Modifying certain AoE attacks to nudge their performance into a top spot again Modifying Repair into a useful power to maintain the theme of Robots being a very durable set General Bots Changes Repair > Repair Drones | Altered to now be a toggled summon similar to the P2W pets Aside from AoE damage, the other major selling point for Robotics is their durability. The Protector Bots supply shielding to you and the team, as well as apply the occasional heal to your robots while you are free to supplement with buffs and heals of your own! However, the unique heal found in Repair is often skipped due to it really not being competitive with other healing options. 10/16 Mastermind Secondaries have options to directly heal your pets, and comparing Repair to other Single Target heals it has an edge in restoring 100% health as well as 25% endurance, but the downside of a base 120s recharge is simply not worth it as a Single Target power. Compared to other ST heals such as Thermal's Cauterize, it loses out when you could pick that up and have it recharge in 4 seconds or less, and heal close to 400hp, which is good enough for most tricky situations outside of "my bot is essentially dead". Even the Protector Bots will heal ~210 HP to a single robot every 30 seconds, with two of them you can heal a total of 1680 health in the time it takes for Repair to recharge, when the most it can heal is 962 with a lvl 50 Assault bot with 1 hp remaining. Its not like you can use it on allies either to give it a niche, it only works on your bots! So, what can we do to flip the worst heal in the game? Luckily, the Protector Bots also get access to Seeker Drones, which we can borrow and alter into something a bit more thematic: Upon activation, summon 2 (Repair Drones) which occasionally heal your Robots with the same version of Repair that the Protector Bots use (as well as restore 25% endurance). In addition, they each provide a 15ft radius aura that boosts Regeneration by 40%, and Recovery by 20% to yourself, pets, and allies in range! Like the P2W pets, these are summoned via a Toggle (1.25 end/sec) and have a 90s recharge once they are destroyed or you manually shut off the toggle. If either are killed, or you turn off the toggle, the Drone will detonate and cast an AoE version of Repair to all bots in a 15ft radius. Repair Drones have 400 base HP at level 50 and 75% resistance to all damage. This is a lot to break down, so lets start with how this functions. Like with the P2W pets, you will summon these little guys and they'll follow you for as long as you have endurance to run the toggle, or they are defeated / you shut them off. This gives you a choice to keep them out and provide continual healing for a hefty endurance cost, or to summon and detonate as fast as you can for a very good AoE heal to your team. Their armor plating likewise helps them take a couple hits to let you keep them around a bit, but is not so much that they cannot be defeated as well and spark the pulse-heal in a heated situation. The choice is your's to keep them out often and save them through tough fights, or spend them ASAP for a burst fo healing and then a lengthy cooldown. The Regen and Recovery auras are icing on the cake between the 30s heals they provide to your bots, giving yourself and the team some sustainability and cementing them as the premiere tanky Mastermind primary. New Attribute | Disintegration Laser, Photon, and Plasma Powers now have a chance to proc Disintegration on enemies hit, allowing further laser attacks to deal more damage The real major change to Robotics is the proliferation of Disintegration from Beam Rifle to the OG laser wielders. Aimed at making the non-assault bot pets more offensively useful, as well as propping up their ST damage output, Disintegration works similarly to what we see in beam rifle: Both the Mastermind's personal Laser Rifle attacks and the pet's Laser/Photon/Plasma attacks have a 25% chance to trigger Disintegration on enemies they hit. When triggered, the enemy will be afflicted with an Energy DoT equal to 50% of the power's damage over the next 10 seconds. This DoT can stack up on the same target from multiple attacks, and while the target has at least 1 Disintegrate DoT active they will receive an additional Energy Damage proc when struck by further laser attacks equal to 25% of the Laser's damage! The stacking DoT and bonus damage on attacks that aren't Missiles/Flamethrowers aim to to help you not have to slog through missions before you have the Assault Bot, and still boosts ST DPS once you get it on the team to help still with that spot between 26 and 32. With this mechanic in mind, along with the other global changes + bots changes below, lets see how they compare with the similarly changed primaries: With Disintegrate the DPS climbs to be 75% of Thugs instead of nearly half! This is a substantial improvement, but with Disintegrate also being able to be applied in an AoE with certain attacks we felt it was important to keep Bots as a lower end for ST while not being abysmal. Also, with the new Repair Drones they trade ST damage for survival. Likewise, with these changes they climb to be the top AoE set with the baseline being a bit better than Thugs with their changes (see Other thread), and with Disintegrate they have a healthy 16% lead. Keep in mind these values are assuming the 25% chance of causing the status, so with luck the damage could go higher! Along with the tweaks below, our goal is to make Bots the Tank analogue in Homecoming where they can spread a lot of damage across the field and survive well, while not being the fastest to take down a single target on average. Battle Drones These MK1 Battle Drones are your bread and butter minions through your time as a Bots MM, but they are somewhat lackluster later on. There is one noticeable power that stands out negatively for them. Battle Drone Mod 1: Full Auto Laser | Reduced activation time from 6.33s to 4.33s Available from Upgrade Robot Yowza, 6.33s is a long animation! Simply lowering this down to 4.33s will be a huge QOL improvement as the bots are no longer rooted in place so much. Protector Bots The Protector Bots allow the set to be incredibly durable with their helpful shields, heals, and debuffs. They can stand to gain a few QoL changes though! Protector Bot Mod 1: Force Shield | Single Target > Targeted AoE Available from base summon Same philosophy as regular Force Fields, having to shield each bot one at a time takes up far too much of their time and changing it to a one and done buff will work wonders. Protector Bot Mod 2: Repair | Additionally restores 25% Endurance Available from Equip Robots Altered to match the Repair Drones. They both share this same power. Protector Bot Mod 3: Photon Grenade | Boost base damage by 1.5x (22.52 > 33.78 at lvl 50) | -20% Heal on Disintegrating Targets Available from Upgrade Robots While primarily a stunning attack, the damage dealt by the Protector bots is somewhat lacking. Boosting this move will help Bot's overall AoE damage and slightly help with ST damage as the bigger base damage allows for a bit more Disintegration DoT. Additionally, this alongside the Mastermind's own Photon Grenade apply a -Healing debuff on enemies who are suffering from Disintegration. Assault Bot The inarguable backbone of your robotic forces, the Assault Bot has always brought the heat. It only requires a few changes in tandem with the new Disintegrate mechanic as well as touching up the powers it gains from the Equip Robots, which many bots players force it to skip! Assault Bot Mod : Plasma Blast | Disintegration Spread Available from Equip Robots The bread and butter attack for the Assault Bot, this change allows them to spread the status to assist the other bots in the set as well as spread DoT. Assault Bot Mod 2: Dual Plasma Blast | Increase Target Cap from 5 to 10, increase Blast Radius to 8 ft | Disintegration Spread Available from Equip Robots Something that goes unnoticed is that the Dual Plasma blast from the Assault bot is actually a Targeted AoE attack! Splashing off the primary target, up to 5 others within a tiny 5ft radius can currently be affected by the impact. This slight change will help push the Bot's AoE damage up a bit more as it will be easier to catch more targets as well as spread any disintegration effects like with the Single target Plasma Blast. Assault Bot Mod 3: Flamethrower | Decrease animation time from 6.33s to 4.33s Available from Equip Robots This power is the sole reason so many actually opt to skip the T1 upgrade on the Assault Bot. Like with the Battle Drones, a 6.33 second animation is insanely long to be rooted despite the power actually doing very respectable damage for it's recharge. Shaving 2 seconds off of the time will simply let the Assault Bot be more fluid in it's actions and let the set function a bit more smoothly overall. Overall these changes to Robotics aim to keep the set Tanky and AoE focused while keeping it's ST weakness to a degree. Their new laser-focus should help tremendously early on combined with the global MM changes before you have the Assault bot, and make for a much smoother leveling experience while still retaining the same overall niche the set provides.

Mastermind Global Changes Addressing survivability, enhancement viability, and ever-cherished fun factor, these changes are proposed to help MM's across the board wrangle the all too familiar issues with the Archetype. This thread unveils proposals for Global changes, and the links to the Primary Powerset Proposals are below. There's a lot to unravel, so take your time! Robotics Necromancy Mercenaries Ninjas Thugs Demons Beast Mastery MM's need help. Despite being a very popular AT overall (3rd place behind Blasters and Brutes respectively!) they drop off significantly in the number of lvl 50's to where only 4.7% of MM's ever hit lvl 50, where the average for all other AT's is 9%. (Source Below) The reason? At higher levels, the consensus appears to be that MM's drop off in effectiveness rather harshly due to four key factors: MM Damage scales / end costs make it so it is troublesome to be effective at all without pets, somewhat forcing the "Tankermind" play style to be effective Pet survival at higher difficulties that other AT's can handle severely cripples MM effectiveness Due to the above, the Pet Aura IOs (And MM ATO's) are more or less required to participate in mid-higher end content Due to the above and kinks with pets in general, slotting becomes difficult and non-renumerative. These four, along with some quirks here and there, feed into one another to make MM's have a sort of bell curve where they start weaker, get very strong, but then weaken again as your character is expected to take on more and more challenges. Crunching the numbers, there are a few changes that could be made that will help MMs at the high end while having a minimal impact on the low end. Mastermind Stats Starting with the Mastermind themselves, the AT as a whole is in an odd spot in that thematically and mechanically, its all about your pets. This is super fun for many of us... but when pressure from high end content or the variety of builds available to other AT's with IOs comes up, pet-centric limitations can be constraining. This is because henchmen cannot be slotted with the same pool of IOs others have, such as melee damage, and are limited to secondary effects and pet damage in slotting. To make up for their poor personal performance, almost all MM's default to "Tankerminding" thanks to Bodyguard Mode. While in Defensive stance, and setting the pets to anything but "Attack my Target", masterminds shift to being an incredibly tanky class as they split their damage between up to 6 pets within Supremacy Range, and since the pets will attack those who attack you or them re-actively, this sets the sort of standard of how to play as your MM can be incredibly tough while maintaining their pets, but this shoehorns them into one path that has problems when you scale up to higher content. And, due to the low damage and exceptionally great endurance cost of mastermind abilities, there is little reward for straying from the path. Solution: More dynamic Supremacy Stances MM's have two other major stances to work with, Aggressive and Passive, and in those neglected modes there can lie a solution. In the former, your pets will simply attack on sight and go full aggro mode. This bares little functional utility, as they attack the same as they would provoked in defensive mode, and you lose Bodyguard and thus put yourself at extreme risk with little reward. Some MMs simply put this on during a team setting if others have Aggro, leaving their pets to fend for themselves while they are reduced to a discount Defender. If you turn on Aggressive mode and try to keep up and contribute with your team / pets, you'll find yourself suffering from the endurance penalty, sucking endurance down rapidly and dealing little damage overall while having less pet control. Passive mode has your pets halt all actions unless directed by you specifically and is mostly used when travelling so that they don't pick up extra aggro, or to pull back and retreat effectively. The common gripe with these other stances is that they have nothing to really compete with the advantage of Bodyguard mode. So: Defensive Stance Gives the MM access to Bodyguard Mode Aggressive Stance Provides the MM with a 5% Damage Bonus and a 5% Endurance Discount per pet Passive Stance Provides the Pets with a 150% Regeneration and Recovery bonus Lets add some perks to the other two stances! Starting with Aggressive Mode, when you switch to this your MM gets an average 30% bonus to Damage and a 30% Endurance Discount (with 6 pets and you going ham) in order to not only allow the MM to do a bit of damage with what attacks they do have, but also get an endurance discount on their abilities to allow them to actually play "unleashed" like their pets. Plotting out with 3 Damage SO's and 1 End Redux SO, we see the following (assuming 30%): Aggressive Math: Base Dmg Base End Aggressive Dmg Aggressive End 3 Dmg SO 1 End SO Defender Dmg Defender End Burst 33.04 6.5 42.95 5 74.34 3.99 76.13 4 Slug 50.16 10.66 65.21 8.2 112.86 6.54 115.6 6.56 M30 27.53 18.98 35.79 14.6 61.94 11.64 63.43 11.68 Using the Mercenary Primary's attacks, we see that with similar Slotting + Aggressive mode, an MM is about on Par with a Defender using the same powers in /Assault Rifle (without Vigilance boosts). MM's get far fewer attacks to use compared to a Defender, and the damaging support moves they get will be on par but with far worse secondary effects... along with a fraction of the personal defense if they get hit outside of Bodyguard mode. This is aimed to make being truly "Aggro" with an MM a viable strategy compared to turtling up at all times. The Passive Mode change is to help more with the Pet's survival and downtime in general. Often there can be cases where you may be in over your head, and backing off to reset the situation takes a bit of time esp when needing to resummon or heal up. With this passive mode change your pets will have much less downtime and overall better sustain between fights. Pet Survival Next is easily the biggest and most important. To put it simply, the way enemies scale vs your pets is not ideal. Once you have all 6 pets, your Boss Pet will be = to your level, the LT's will be -1, and the Minions will be -2. That latter portion is a killer for them as on average, the minions make up ~27% of the damage output of each MM primary, even WITH them being -2! With them being killed so easily, this would be like if any other AT's damage scaled down as they lost health, and a solid hit taking away 25% of their HP meant they did 25% less damage. Even worse, when playing at the maximum difficulty the T1 pets get hit extra-hard by enemies thanks to the Accuracy Formula: Source: https://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Attack_Mechanics Spawning at -2 to you, a +4 enemy to the MM will be +6 to the poor T1 minion. If an enemy were to target them, they get a bonus 5% ToHit on top of a 1.5x accuracy modifier. To illustrate how bad this is, lets take a look at the Hit Chance formula: HitChance = Clamp[95%]( AccMods × (1 - TargetElusivity) × Clamp[5%]( BaseHitChance + ToHitMods – DefMods ) ) Now, lets assume a +4 enemy minion is taking a swing at our -2 T1 minion: HitChance = Clamp( 1.5 × (1 - 0) × Clamp( 0.50+ 0.05 – 0) ) HitChance = Clamp( 1.5 × (1) × Clamp( 0.55) ) HitChance = Clamp( 1.5 × Clamp( 0.55) ) HitChance = 82.5% Thanks to that +5% ToHit, the "Soft Cap" to hit the 5% clamp on that side of the formula would need to be 50% defense. Even with that, we see (1.5 x .05) = 7.5% chance to be hit at the absolute minimum. This effectively makes each point of defense you give them a smidge less in value as they need that much more to Soft Cap, and even when they do they still lose out on the minimal chance thanks to the Accuracy bonus. If they are against a LT, Boss, or AV? The acc mods stack up even higher. While being hit 7.5% of the time doesn't sound too bad, remember that the purple patch also affects damage taken, and damage dealt! At -6 to your targets, the T1 minions will take 1.66x damage BEFORE resistances, and in turn will deal a paltry 0.15x damage in response! (More info on lvl scale and damage: https://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Purple_Patch) Even when teamed, you cannot realistically buff them enough to not have them survive well enough and thus you constantly lose out on damage that other characters simply do not have to. There are two additions that will solve these issues. Addition 1: T1 Pets Gain +1 level (Past lvl 18) The simplest solution is to ensure that the T1 pets (not underlings like Gang War or Hell on Earth) stay as -1 Level to you past lvl 18. Right away, this will increase their relative defense values by 1.1x as they retain a 45% soft cap vs even the strongest of normal enemies like all other pets and characters, instead of 50%. They also gain effectively 11% resistance to damage as they go from taking 1.66x damage to 1.55x damage vs +4 enemies (likewise, they go from taking 1.22x to 1.11x at even level),. and deal 15% more damage to +4 targets as they leap from 0.15x to 0.30x damage! (Vs even level, this is a 10% jump from 0.8x to 0.9x). This one change will even the playing field to have the T1 pets provide ~31% of the DPS at -1 across all MM primaries (averaged) , and be minimally impactful at lower levels and difficulties. If anything it will help smooth the progression for many sets in that awkward phase between 18 and 32! It was decided not to bump up all the pets to get +1 level, or match your level for consideration of the lower levels of gameplay and the effect that would have. Simply smoothing out the weakest link in the T1's will go a long way for a new foundation combined with the other changes being proposed below. Addition 2: T1 and T2 Pet HP increase Combined with the level shift (which provides a very, very small HP boost), the hp growth of the T1 and T2 should be increased by 10% and 5% respectively. The HP growth refers to the ending HP they get at lvl 48-50 as all 3 tiers start with ~91 base HP: Minion (49) LT (49) Boss (50) 576.6 768.8 963.8 59.83% 79.77% 1 % of Boss 634.26 807.24 963.8 65.81% 83.76% 1 % of Boss 10% +HP 5% +HP With the T1 at lvl 49 as well, smoothing out the HP between the three pets gives them just a bit more survival overall and comes with a wealth of benefits. Pet Movement All pets gain a 35% base run speed boost Somewhat related to the survival concerns. While not as directly impactful as a +1 lvl shift on T1 pets past lvl 18, one thing that had changed on live was the introduction of Inherent Fitness. All characters, including MM's, having swift efectively made the game faster by about (35%) as players could traverse the environment quicker even with all movement powers turned off. Pets did not get this luxury, and often are stuck trailing behind the MM even if the MM is going as slow as they can. A simple base speed increase will help with the positioning of pets for both survival, offensive pressure (Melee pets), and general utility. Removal of Automatic Distance Based Teleport, Addition of a "Come to me" Command Not only a practicality-seeking proposal, this suggestion would offer greater customization and control of pets behavior. The Come to Me Command, or "Come" from the pet menu, would simply be a manual pet teleport functioning exactly how the auto-spawn teleport works now. Upon selecting "Come" much like "Follow" or "Stay", the henchmen would teleport to the casters location. There would be no control over where the pets spawn; the pets will simply appear at your location at the time of selection. Removing auto teleport would not only allow more convenient travel by use of "Stay" and "Come" commands in concert, but would also improve the application of "Stay" for fun activities like leaving your pets at multiple locations across the zone as amusing objects for players to discover. Roleplayers could find themselves setting up "watch-points" or what not, as they direct their pets to speak zone wide. Pet IO "Tax" Possibly the most controversial. There are currently two major pet ranks. "Pet" and "Henchmen". Henchmen are the types of pet that Masterminds cast, with varying strengths between the Minion, Lieutentant, and Boss types. Pets are the class summonable by control type ATs. Henchmen, however, are substantially less equipped. Villain Damage Modifiers Archetype Melee Range Corruptor 0.750 0.750 Dominator 1.050 0.950 Mastermind 0.550 0.550 Henchman 1 0.450 0.350 Henchman 2 0.550 0.450 Henchman 3 0.650 0.550 Brute 0.750 0.500 Stalker 1.000 0.600 Arachnos Soldier 1.000 1.000 Arachnos Widow 1.000 1.000 Pet 1.000 0.800 Now, henchmen should be weaker than pets, but it isn't their damage that's troubling, it's their protection. As a result of what we discussed in Pet Survival, their troubles range from highly unsettling to completely fatal in many situations. Their paper thin protection is such that there exists a suite of IO's designed to boost the durability of pets. Both of the MM ATO's boost pet longevity though either Resistance or Defense, 4/5 pet uniques also boost survival for all pets within a radius, with the 5th providing less Taunt/Placate protection than simply taking assault by a large margin. While the non-ATO pet IO's can be used by other ATs with pets, they *really* appear to be designed for MM use, and talking among other pet users there are rare, if existing, occupation of these auras because of their different priorities, slotting for damage themselves, or they have a mix of potent control and end effective shielding which they can protect their pets with. Not to mention, "Pets" having generally higher level, health and defenses than "Henchmen", with Jack Frost's defenses being nearly double that of it's closest analogue, The Demon Prince. Due to the reality above, MM's are somewhat corralled into needing 6 IO's dedicated to simply allowing their pets a fighting chance. Solution: Replace the Unique IO effects, and bake the originals into the T1 and T2 Upgrades A straight-forward suggestion as this predominantly affects Masterminds is to bake the survival upgrades into well, their upgrades! This of course will require the uniques to be retooled, which we will touch on momentarily, but first lets look at how this could work. Tier 1 Upgrade (Lvl 6): Now grants base 10% Res vs All, while in Supremacy Range (60ft from MM). This bonus grows with level, starting at a base of 10% (at lvl 1) and scaling up to 23.94% resistance at lvl 50. This power can now take Resistance Enhancements. Starting with the combined resist aura effects, this is attached to the T1 upgrade as at low level the slight bump to durability will help out without being too unbalanced. As it grows, the value also increases at the same relative rate as the Pet's own resistance powers until it maxes out at ~1 SO away from being that value of the combined auras. If you choose to devote more slots to the upgrade power (taking away form other powers mind you!) you can net more resistances if you so choose. Tier 2 Upgrade (Lvl 32): Now grants base 3.25% Defense vs All as well as bonus 3.25% AoE Defense (7% total), while in Supremacy Range (60ft from MM). This bonus grows with level, starting at a base of 3.5%/7% (at lvl 1) and scaling up to 7.78%/15.56% defense at lvl 50. This power can now take Defense Enhancements. The combined defense auras are attached to the T2 upgrade as the defense boost compounded with everything else you have will be a significant buff to survival at that point in the game. As it grows, the value also increases at the same relative rate as the Pet's own resistance powers until it maxes out at ~1 SO away from being that value of the combined auras. If you choose to devote more slots to the upgrade power (taking away form other powers mind you!) you can net more resistances if you so choose. With the defense boosts growing by level and as you slot and upgrade pets, that leaves a lot of room left over to give the IO's a makeover: Command of the Mastermind (50% chance of KB Protection on Pets), 5% +Damage aura to all within Supremacy Range (Self, Pets, Allies) S. Command of the MM (75% chance of KB Protection on Pets), 7.5% +Damage aura to all within Supremacy Range (Self, Pets, Allies) Mark of Supremacy 3 PPM Negative Damage Proc (Slottable into Primary Attacks) S. Mark of Supremacy 4 PPM Negative Damage Proc (Slottable into Primary Attacks) Pet IOs Call to Arms Chance of Lethal DoT on Pet Attacks (2 ppm) Expedient Reinforcement 25% Pet Movement Speed and Debuff Resistance (all) Sovereign Right Chance to proc -5% damage debuff on Pet Abilities (2 ppm) Edict of the Master Pets gain Mag 4 CC Protection (Immob, Sleep, Stun, Hold, Confuse, Fear) Commanding Presence Pets gain 100% Regen and Recovery These have all been redesigned to offer more utility or damage opportunities to not only MM pets but to other pets as well. The MM ATO's are now designed to give a bit of a bonus to team mates as well as yourself and pets by providing a bonus within Supremacy Range, and helping your pets avoid knockback similarly to the PvP Teleportation IO. The 2nd IO bonus offers a Negative Energy damage proc that can be used on any and all MM abilities, which will prove quite useful depending on the pet or power! Call to Arms is similarly a proc that can apply on any pet attack, but applies a DoT with much less of a proc rate. Similarly, Sovereign Right can apply a stacking Damage Debuff. Expedient Reinforcement and Commanding Presence give the pets good sustain and utility with debuff resists, movement, and regen/recovery. Finally, Edict of the Master gives all pets CC protection to the major CC's aside from Knockback. These should all be valuable, but now with other options covering the basic needs (MM attacks and the upgrades may be worth slotting now!) they are no longer so "mandatory" for MM performance, and likewise still offer great utility to non-MM pets. Primary Overview (Damage Comparison) In the following threads (links at the top), we'll be going over major shake ups to primaries that will re adjust the balance of power between DPA and ST / AOE DPS. The end results will be as follows: DPA in 1 "Cycle": (VALUES ARE NON ENHANCED) Defined as the damage dealt within 1 rotation of their powers as a unit, this eyeballs the burst-offense of the sets with different X factors shown in the colored sections. In general, our goal is to have primaries that are stronger defensively have a bit less damage, and vice versa, with the primaries that require a lot of setting up also being rewarded. This is why despite Demons having solid defenses overall, they still remain very damaging once they stack up -Res and the Hell on Earth minions / Bonuses. Just a special note, but Jounin Caltrops can theoretically do a dumb amount of damage naturally if you are able to stack them / crit them and keep an enemy in the radius. This is why we have a Ninja-Trops section. ST DPS: The average DPS over time of all their abilities. Similar to the DPA above, a distinction is made where generally tougher pets deal less DPS, and specifically AoE heavy sets deal a bit less ST damage. AoE DPS: Lastly, factoring in the Area and Target values for the AoE attacks seen in each primary, we get these DPS values for total damage dealt across a spawn using only AoE attacks. The ST attacks of pets spread across different targets is important as well, but very hard to quantify. Conclusion These changes combined should set up a new foundation for MM's in the current meta to be much smoother across all levels, and especially at end game. In fact, based off of responses gathered from discord and in-game discussion, they should be of great use to other pet casters who gain little to no benefit from the auras to begin with. Some of these changes may be controversial, but if even some of them are considered officially, I would consider it a big step up for the AT as a whole. And if you all feel the same way, good news -- there are many more proposals where that came from!

Small request, but Dual Blades apparently has the Battle Axe as a customization option, but only the default axe. Could this be expanded to all axe options?

right, which is why I didnt even factor them in. Even with capped recharge their uptimes are either still ridiculously short, or set in stone.

Thank you! 🙂