Khy-2

Ho boy. Let me start by saying, I love mercs. I love 'em because I love how they use assault rifles which eject shells so that my Mercs/Storm Mastermind can fly around literally surrounded by a swirling cloud of brass whenever I turn on Hurricane. But man, Mercs are lackluster and you can tell. They need an edge. They need... spiciness! Something enjoyable and interesting and unique to them. So first let's talk the pets themselves. Soldiers are just fine for what they are - the grunts, the low-level nobodies who do the heavy lifting. 2 soldiers and a medic. The medic... well, he just isn't all that great at what he does, is he? I mean yes - he heals other soldiers, but only a small heal and it's on a longish cooldown. And he can apply a stimulant to one pet at random every so often that really is un-noticeable in its effectiveness. 2 paths we can take here - Keep the medic and make him more useful, or ditch the medic for another grunt. IMO I'd rather keep the medic but change two things. For one, replace his normal heal with a PBAoE regen aura. Something smallish, but always on. Second, make Stimulant apply to all of your pets when he applies it instead of just the one. Second, Specops. I love these guys myself, for the aesthetic. I also like how their powers are varied - gives 'em flavor! Only a couple minor changes here - For one, replace Rifle Butt (Melee, moderate damage, Disorient) with Beanbag (Ranged, minor damage, Disorient). Same power, less damage, but ranged as your pets really shouldn't be in melee 99% of the time. Second, give 'em Toxic web grenades. I've seen this suggested many times and I really think it's a good idea! Commando could use work because his AoE is meh. His cones are super narrow and his rocket's on a ridiculous cooldown. Tweak the cooldowns on all his AoE abilities, widen the cone of Full Auto and Flamethrower... he'd definitely be a bit closer to the killing machine we were promised then. So with the pets down, let's talk the unique ability - Serum. It sucks. There's no real way IMO to fix it and I don't think it needs FIXING, I think it needs complete replacement. So with that in mind a couple ideas for replacements : 1) Pineapples. When used, every one of your pets throws a grenade to the targetted area. Soldiers' hand grenades do lethal AoE damage. Specops Pulse Grenades do energy AoE damage, with a -tohit debuff attached. And the commando's thermite grenade is a high-damage fire AoE DoT with a -res effect. The more pets you have summoned and alive, the better the power gets! 2) Artillery Barrage. Calls in an off-map artillery strike that fires down in a clustered area around wherever you're targetting. Not tied directly to your pets, but still matches the army/soldier theme. 3) Arms Deal. Equips your soldiers with high-tech weapons for a short time (60 seconds), with a long cooldown (360 Seconds). All pets gain a 30% boost in damage, your medic's regen aura is boosted during this time, and each pet applies a special effect to enemies while the power is active (Soldiers get Superheated Ammo which applies a minor fire DoT to all attacks, Specops get Cryo Ammo which apply a slow and -regen effect to all attacks, and your Commando gets Explosive Ammo which causes all his attacks to do bonus AoE damage). Great for burn phases on bosses, great for clearing out crowds, on a decently long timer but that's because it's WORTH it when you pop that power. In non-balance-related options, I'd like to see the specops replaced with female soldiers instead of male (I'd say all soldiers have a chance to spawn female but that might mess with MM's who like to assign names to pets). I also think that when customizing the Mastermind's weapon, that customization should apply to Soldier and Commando weapons as well (If possible, not sure if the engine can handle that) since I think full customization for all soldiers would be incredibly hard to program.