Mastermind changes in beta

[Mack008]

Frankly, I don't want an Auto-upgrade, and the reduced summon times aren't needed either.  Losing a pet in the middle of a fight should be painful.  That's the offset for having six minions do your bidding.  The player should be incentivized to keep their pets alive in the first place.  The pets are the MM's power; losing them means losing power.  A MM should be protective of his/her pets and not have an unlimited supply of replacements on standby.

[Arbegla]

4 hours ago, Coyote said:

 

Vengeance alone is the reason why this won't ever happen. Especially on an AT that has Power Boost available as an Epic. By itself, Vengeance is easily perma-able 33% Defense with no holes, and knockdown protection. Add in Power Boost and you're soft-capped to all. Add in some IOs, Maneuvers, and some other pool defenses, and you're over 60% Defense. Oh, and it has a damage boost and enough +ToHit that you shouldn't need to slot Accuracy (except in the pet powers).

 

That's fair. Maybe increase the recharge (or reduce the duration) so it's not permanent. 

[HachiMan2015]

On 3/30/2021 at 10:42 AM, Mack008 said:

 

  The pets are the MM's power; losing them means losing power.  A MM should be protective of his/her pets and not have an unlimited supply of replacements on standby.

 

I totally agree on no auto upgrades, I don't have an issue upgrading with each summons, but for your second point, no other AT is "punished" by losing access to their primary for a period of time.  You still have to upgrade them, buff them with other abilities etc so it will still be a small inconvenience when they die.

[Maxzero]

1 hour ago, HachiMan2015 said:

 

I totally agree on no auto upgrades, I don't have an issue upgrading with each summons, but for your second point, no other AT is "punished" by losing access to their primary for a period of time.  You still have to upgrade them, buff them with other abilities etc so it will still be a small inconvenience when they die.

 

I wouldn't mind the downside if when we do the right thing we are rewarded with above average performance.

[HachiMan2015]

52 minutes ago, Maxzero said:

 

I wouldn't mind the downside if when we do the right thing we are rewarded with above average performance.

Do you mean a boost to damage or accuracy if we fulfill a certain requirement? What types of things were you thinking? I'm curious now. 

 

Or are you saying that MM pets performance is poor to begin with and you wouldn't mind a long recharge as long they had a buff in the future rather than a deceased recharge time?

 

Not trolling just genuinely curious

 

[Arbegla]

59 minutes ago, Maxzero said:

 

I wouldn't mind the downside if when we do the right thing we are rewarded with above average performance.

 

This got the gears in my head turning a bit, and I thought of an idea.

 

What if there was a timed based buff that MM pets got to longer they stayed alive? Or after X number of kills? Something small, like 1% tohit/2% damage that stacked say, 10 times? That way, if you manage to keep your pets alive longer, they hit more often, and do more damage, but if you're constantly refreshing your pets, you don't receive that bonus?

[HachiMan2015]

22 minutes ago, Arbegla said:

 

This got the gears in my head turning a bit, and I thought of an idea.

 

What if there was a timed based buff that MM pets got to longer they stayed alive? Or after X number of kills? Something small, like 1% tohit/2% damage that stacked say, 10 times? That way, if you manage to keep your pets alive longer, they hit more often, and do more damage, but if you're constantly refreshing your pets, you don't receive that bonus?

That's what I was thinking too, but I wonder if it will cause problems somewhere down the line that math people on here would be able to explain 😜

[FM5]

Want to help MMs?  Stop letting the T1s (and T2s?) get one-shotted.

Even with all the auras and buffs including team buffs, in some content there's no point in summoning the lower tier pets unless you are a ranged character and keep them by your side.  

 

Is a ranged character choosing to keep them by their side so they don't die immediately a "tactical decision" like some people have been talking about? I guess.  Some comments said an MM is doing x% damage without having to work much at it due to pets attacking on their own.  That's true.  But it's not true in hard content where the pets die immediately.  Those pets are doing zero damage. And when dead they're not even a help with bodyguard mode.

 

Someone said they have no problem in hard content. Then they said their character is bots.  Of course they don't have a problem since they are ranged.  

 

Whether eliminating the level shifts would help instead of just more hit points, I don't know at this time.  

I do think this in beta shortening of summoning is a good step to help with mobility especially in groups.  In mobile groups, an MM is often married to their secondary.  It's like playing half a character. 

 

I haven't put much thought into auto Upgrade powers, but, question: don't pets like the Umbra Beast come summoned in basically an upgraded form? I haven't compared the stats, but playing a dom with Umbra Beast didn't seem too different (in their damage output) compared to playing an MM with upgraded Dire Wolf. 

[Crysis]

Buffing MM’s is, I’ll admit, going to be a challenge.  Increase sturdiness/HP’s of henchmen too much and you basically have done same for MM as you’ve enhanced BG mode.  Reduce END costs for MM too much, and with a high +Recharge build MM’s secondaries can rival other AT’s just from double/triple stacking stuff.  Eliminate level shifts and having an MM on the team effectively can double/triple the team size, and DPS with it.

 

Ultimately I’m not sure how to buff the MM AT without breaking it to the side of OP.  Perhaps not all builds but many.  I have several Thugs/, Demon/, Bots/ and /Time or /Storm MM’s already that easily solo AV’s or +4/x8 content.  You could hand select certain primary or secondary sets for some buffs perhaps but not all.

[TygerDarkstorm]

16 hours ago, FM5 said:

 

 

I haven't put much thought into auto Upgrade powers, but, question: don't pets like the Umbra Beast come summoned in basically an upgraded form? I haven't compared the stats, but playing a dom with Umbra Beast didn't seem too different (in their damage output) compared to playing an MM with upgraded Dire Wolf. 

Pets that come with control sets are not equivalent to MM henchmen. First and foremost because they can not be controlled themselves, not to mention that they are not the entirety of the dom or controller's power source.

[PsychoThruster]

One thing that might be worth considering for the AT as a whole is trying to move it away from body guard dependence. Perhaps removing level shifts, keeping resummon times on the longer side, and playing with the ai a bit more so aggressive stance actually allows henchmen to utilize their full range. I know my mercs can attack from 80ft with a direct attack target command but when in aggressive stance this is easily halved. 

 

I also don't see why the secondary powers with shields shouldn't also apply to the MM. It's certainly not unprecedented considering traps ff gen already does so. 

 

If bg mode is gone, Level shifts removed, secondary buffs affect the MM, and aggressive command allows full range to be utilized then the AT can play offense more effectively. 

 

Supremacy could even be changed into a more active power, something that works like the fury bar, but based on henchmen damage that when full allows a powerful but temporary buff or summon. 

 

If possible another helpful feature would be a couple formation options like seen in crpgs. Mitigating the need for extensive macro and binds, allowing smoother play in average mob clearing situations. For instance making a shoulder to shoulder line formation to facilitate getting cone attacks somewhat more optimally positioned.

[TygerDarkstorm]

39 minutes ago, PsychoThruster said:

I also don't see why the secondary powers with shields shouldn't also apply to the MM. It's certainly not unprecedented considering traps ff gen already does so. 

This would then also need to be changed for Defenders, Corruptors, and Controllers.

[FM5]

4 hours ago, TygerDarkstorm said:

Pets that come with control sets are not equivalent to MM henchmen. First and foremost because they can not be controlled themselves, not to mention that they are not the entirety of the dom or controller's power source.

You're right. Which is why even without casting the Upgrades on the MM's Dire WOlf, the Dire Wolf should be OP compared to the Umbra Beast.  Is it?

 

And the Umbra Beast has better overall resists and knockdown etc protection than the Upgraded Dire Wolf does.

Edited April 4, 2021 by FM5

[TheMoncrief]

On 4/2/2021 at 2:48 PM, HachiMan2015 said:

Do you mean a boost to damage or accuracy if we fulfill a certain requirement? What types of things were you thinking? I'm curious now. 

 

Or are you saying that MM pets performance is poor to begin with and you wouldn't mind a long recharge as long they had a buff in the future rather than a deceased recharge time?

 

Not trolling just genuinely curious

 

Personally I'd settle for keeping all the pets at the MM's level. It's already happening in Incarnate content, and MM's still aren't ruling the roost there. The level reduction for low tier pets is super painful when going against content that is common at high levels - ie, +4/x8. Or +4/xanything.

[PsychoThruster]

1 minute ago, TheMoncrief said:

Personally I'd settle for keeping all the pets at the MM's level. It's already happening in Incarnate content, and MM's still aren't ruling the roost there. The level reduction for low tier pets is super painful when going against content that is common at high levels - ie, +4/x8. Or +4/xanything.

 

It's painful when leveling too

[Arbegla]

The big issue that I've noticed with the beta changes is that it really encourages refreshing the pets as a full heal instead of keeping the pets around when you try to resummon things. 

 

You should be encouraged to keep your pets, regardless of the shape they are in once your recharge is up.

[gabrilend]

Hello. I saw the changes on the patch notes so I came looking for some discussion on these forums. I read through all the comments y'all made here and there's some good points being made, lots of which are being lost in the discussion of "auto vs upgrade"

I think the training powers should be left as they are. I'm not even convinced yet about the reduction in summon recharge time. Just my 2¢

 

 - Here's why - feel free to skip the next 2 paragraphs if you don't care about nostalgia:

 

I play ninjas and dark miasma. I mostly just patrol and explore, but sometimes I'll do a mission or two. My Genin die pretty often, so I usually leave them on defensive and follow to keep me safe. My Jounin and Oni are pretty good at fighting, so I usually send them into the fray and I'll toss 'em a smoke bomb every once in a while to keep them alive. When they die, it sucks, but I do my best to heal them and debuff the baddies and it works pretty well. I don't know why you guys are complaining about purple enemies when you should be fighting white -> orange enemies. The enemy minions should be your level imho, and fighting higher level baddies is just asking for trouble. I guess there's only so much you can do at max level, but I wouldn't know even though I've played this game for a long time.

 

I think the devs should be making the game harder rather than easier! Everything went off the rails when they added the university to the live game, because you could make very strong enhancements that trivialized the rest that dropped from enemies. But I digress, that tangent isn't relevant - I'm not a very high tier player (obviously) but I think my perspective is also at least a little valuable because it's rare on forums like this. And maybe the game isn't designed for me anymore, and I guess that's okay. Anyway, the point is that your minions should be cherished and shepherded with care. I worry that with the reduced summon time, they might not be as valuable to keep alive.

 

 - Anyway... skip to here if you don't care about my story and just want the feedback:

 

Reducing the cooldown makes it easier to resummon your pets (obviously) and I think that should be discouraged because it reduces their significance. I understand the mobility concerns, and maybe it's just that ninjas are stealthy or something but I've never had problems with pulling groups that I didn't intend. I'm also dark miasma and I have shadows fall, so maybe that's cheating in this respect LOL - But if you let one die, I think you *should* be punished with less damage output. You allowed your pawns to fall in battle, and expect an endless supply to arrive at your beck and call? No way, nobody would follow you if they knew they wouldn't be cared for like a precious commodity.

 

I like the ninja training powers. Maybe they're more bothersome on other powersets, but to me it feels like my guys are average run of the mill ninjas fresh out of some mountaintop monastery that I'm imparting mystic power unto - like I'm enchanting them with my dark evil power. If they showed up pre-enchanted it wouldn't have that fantasy, which I think would be at least a little bit of a loss - I'd feel less like a "master" and more like a "mind". I think those two terms have to be in equilibrium in order to maintain the fantasy.

 

 - HERE'S MY IDEA - skip here if you don't care about the previous two paragraphs:

 

PART 1: Keep the training powers, make them single target only again, and make them recursive. If you educate one ninja, allow that ninja to educate the others by bundling the equip power into the equip power, and making only targets without the buff viable targets. So, if you resummon one in the middle of the fight, your other guys will be able to educate the newly arrived minion, slightly reducing their damage output as they cast the spell but not bothering the mastermind with petty details such as getting the new guy up to speed. The downside is it removes the tactical choice mentioned previously in this thread. So we can't stop here ->

 

PART 2: Make it so that when the ninjas cast the education spell, they take 500% extra damage for the duration of the cast time. But they have to be in melee range. These two limitations wouldn't affect the mastermind version of the spell. So it's a tradeoff, right? When you resummon the pet, they'll stay near you because they default to the "follow" command, and you can upgrade them yourself if you want. Nothing would effectively change in this scenario. But if you wanted the "auto" playstyle, then just summon your pet and send them into the action, and boom you don't have to worry about the upgrade anymore because one of your other guys will handle it. But they'll also make themselves vulnerable for the duration of the cast time, so it's a tradeoff that doesn't disturb the old playstyle, but introduces a new option.

 

Let me know what you think, I'll try and pay attention to this thread. I'd also be 100% okay if they left it as is, but since the devs already changed the re-summon cooldown I worry they might want to change more things. So in the interests of catering to as much of the feedback here as possible, please consider my idea. Thanks for reading <3

[FM5]

On 4/5/2021 at 5:52 PM, gabrilend said:

But if you let one die, I think you *should* be punished with less damage output. You allowed your pawns to fall in battle, and expect an endless supply to arrive at your beck and call? No way, nobody would follow you if they knew they wouldn't be cared for like a precious commodity.

 

I disagree with that.

When I let the other 7 pawns, I mean teammates, on my team die, they usually come back rather quickly.

 

Jokes aside, I'll give an example of not fun.  Doing ITF yesterday in Croatoa with a full team, I had maxed Smashing and probably other resists when I glanced at my resists monitor, and so my beast pets probably did too.  That was just enough to keep the tier 1 pets from being one-shotted when destroying the crystals in the caves.  And there are numerous crystals, so it happens numerous times.  Without the big resists the team happened to have that day, my tier 1s and maybe tier 2s would get one-shotted.  

 

There are other enemies in the game that explode when they die, and other AOE effects, and the tier 1s, sometimes tier 2s, get constantly wiped out so I stop summoning them.  

 

I mentioned the Dark dom's Umbra Beast in a prior post having better overall resists and protections than an upgraded Dire Wolf.  The same dom's lower level Haunt pets also have 1074 hit points.  My tier 1s have 574.  My tier 2s have 768.  People often say Fire Imps are squishy.  They have 1074 hit points. 

 

People often take the radial lore pets to get the invincible one because they say the main pet dies immediately in tough content.  Those have 2500 hp.

 

Sure, I can resummon my pets faster, but 574 hit points seems awfully low. 

[Maxzero]

On 4/3/2021 at 2:48 AM, HachiMan2015 said:

Do you mean a boost to damage or accuracy if we fulfill a certain requirement? What types of things were you thinking? I'm curious now. 

 

Or are you saying that MM pets performance is poor to begin with and you wouldn't mind a long recharge as long they had a buff in the future rather than a deceased recharge time?

 

Not trolling just genuinely curious

 

 

More like if we do everything right as a MM we get to be average. 

 

If I have to herd half a dozen cats across a battlefield when I unleash those same cats I want hell. Instead I get the same impact as the guy who only has to lead one well trained dog.

[Arbegla]

39 minutes ago, Maxzero said:

 

More like if we do everything right as a MM we get to be average. 

 

If I have to herd half a dozen cats across a battlefield when I unleash those same cats I want hell. Instead I get the same impact as the guy who only has to lead one well trained dog.

 

I'll actually second this. If you do everything right as a MM, you're still burning 25% more endurance on your secondary, and you're still herding cats.

And when you unleash those cats, they get stuck in long animation times, or get 1 shot by a random mobs blowing up (Lowbie MMs vs Embalmed Vahz is really fun, or the Paragon Protectors with Inferno...)

[Hjarki]

On 4/3/2021 at 10:45 PM, FM5 said:

Want to help MMs?  Stop letting the T1s (and T2s?) get one-shotted.

Even with all the auras and buffs including team buffs, in some content there's no point in summoning the lower tier pets unless you are a ranged character and keep them by your side. 

For me, the larger issue is that T1 pets tend to get hit with a double whammy by purple patch where they lose damage both from the damage penalty and the hit penalty. It just doesn't make much sense to me. If it's appropriate for T1 pets to be more fragile and do less damage, just make them even level pets with less durability and damage.

 

 

[Arbegla]

18 minutes ago, Hjarki said:

For me, the larger issue is that T1 pets tend to get hit with a double whammy by purple patch where they lose damage both from the damage penalty and the hit penalty. It just doesn't make much sense to me. If it's appropriate for T1 pets to be more fragile and do less damage, just make them even level pets with less durability and damage.

 

 

 

Supremacy is supposed to offset that, but it really doesn't.

[FM5]

52 minutes ago, Hjarki said:

For me, the larger issue is that T1 pets tend to get hit with a double whammy by purple patch where they lose damage both from the damage penalty and the hit penalty. It just doesn't make much sense to me. If it's appropriate for T1 pets to be more fragile and do less damage, just make them even level pets with less durability and damage.

 

 

Yeah, the Purple Patch looks pretty crazy for level-shifted pets. A player fighting a +4 only does 50% of his normal damage. ok. But the tier 1 pets fight it as a +6 and do a ridiculously low 15% of their normal damage.   

 

I think that's rather absurd. As is the to-hit.  Though I think having only 574 hit points is the bigger problem. It sometimes makes me wonder why I bother trying to have MM's with an AOE heal when the pets die from one shot and there's no chance to heal them anyway.  

[Riverdusk]

On 4/4/2021 at 6:20 PM, PsychoThruster said:

 

It's painful when leveling too

 

Yep, MM is the one AT I never join a team that is higher level than me while leveling up.  Because doing that right off the bat puts you at -1 to the leader and the missions you are running. That puts your pets even further behind and they can run into big problems even on modest difficulties.   So, MM to me has less teaming opportunities while leveling up than any of my other AT's.  Good thing I enjoy playing them solo.

 

[Maxzero]

 

And yet when we play incarnate content all the negative level shifts disappear.

 

So if we don't need them for incarnare content why do we need them for the rest of the content?

Edited April 9, 2021 by Maxzero