powerset suggestion Mastermind Primary Powerset Suggestion: Slimes!

[Jeagan]

I've updated an old suggestion to fit into the new leveling scheme for MMs, made a few tweaks to make it flow a bit better, as well as added suggestions for existing assets that can be used to make an all new set of pets! I present to you:

The Slime Lord

This powerset is built around slimes (think Dragon Quest/Warrior). When you use specific powers, or when a slime dies, it splits off a weaker, temporary version of the slime, drowning your foes in a deluge of sludge! Slimes start with some resistance to all damage types, which can be increased moderately with Viscosity and Metalize. Several of your powers involve using your pets in special ways, such as Elemental Fusion changing their secondary effects, or Slime Hurl which attracts your slimes to an enemy while allowing them to split even more!

Slime pets can use the Hamidon or Blarf models in various scales.

Any powers marked with a * have their secondary effect modified by Elemental Infusion.

 

 (1) Sludge Ball (minor damage(acid), moderate DoT (acid), -dam res, fast cooldown) Alkaloid animation from Poison

You hurl a small bundle of slime at the foe.

 

(1 ) Summon Slime Knight

You call forth 1 Knight Slime henchman at your level. When a Knight Slime dies, two Pawn Slimes are spawned for 15 seconds. These slimes cannot be upgraded or controlled. Pawn Slimes are the equivalent of Knight Slimes without any empowerment from skills or enhancements.

At level 6 this power instead summons 2 Knight Slime henchman at your level -1.

At level 18 this power instead summons 3 Knight Slime henchman at your level -2.

 

Knight Slimes start with: 

*Slimeball - (ranged, low damage(smashing), pet elemental secondary*, fast cooldown)

*Slam - (melee, low damage(smashing), pet elemental secondary*, fast cooldown)

High Pain Tolerance - (5% resistance to all damage, passive)

 

 (2) Sludge Hurl (moderate damage(smashing), -Resist, moderate cooldown) Hydro Blast animation from Water Blast

You throw a glob of special sludge at the targeted foe, marking them as a primary target. They take 10% increased damage from all sources for 5 seconds, and any slime that strikes them within that time period automatically spawns a short-lived version of their subordinate slime type.

Knight Slimes spawn a Pawn Slime that lasts for 5 seconds.

Rook Slimes spawn a Bishop Slime that lasts for 5 seconds.

King Slimes spawn a Queen Slime for 5 seconds.

 

 (6) Viscosity - grants abilities to slimes. Affected pets increase their opacity.

All slimes gain:

Temporary Invulnerability (15% resistance to Smashing and Lethal damage)

Pseudopod Slam (short range, single target, low damage(smashing), pet elemental secondary*, fast cooldown)

 

Rook Slimes also gain:

*Spikes (melee PBAoE, moderate damage(lethal), pet elemental secondary*, moderate cooldown)

 

King Slimes also gain:

*Hurl Essence: (ranged, low damage(smashing),pet elemental secondary*, spawn Pawn Slime for 10 seconds)

 

 (8) Spatter (targeted AoE, high DoT, -dam res, moderate cooldown) Water Jet animation from Water Blast

You hurl a glob of slime at a target, which explodes on impact, showering the surrounding foes with a clinging, acidic mucus.

 

 (12) Summon Slime Rook

You call forth 1 Rook Slime henchman at your level. When a Rook Slime dies, two Bishop Slimes are spawned for 15 seconds. These slimes cannot be upgraded or controlled. Bishop Slimes are the equivalent of Rook Slimes without any empowerment from skills or enhancements.

At level 24 this power instead summons 2 Rook Slimes henchmen at your level -1.

 

Rook Slimes start with:

*Slimeball - (ranged, low damage(smashing), pet elemental secondary*, fast cooldown)

*Slam - (melee, low damage(smashing), pet elemental secondary, fast cooldown)

*Pseudopod Slam - (short range, single target, low damage(smashing), pet elemental secondary, fast cooldown)

High Pain Tolerance - (10% resistance to all damage, passive)

 

 (18) Elemental Infusion* - Change the base Element of the targeted slime. Affected pets change color based on their current elemental affinity.

Starting element is Acid (-resistance secondary for pet powers) Yellow-green

Fire (DoT secondary for pet powers) Orange-red

Ice (slow secondary for pet powers) White-blue

Lightning (endurance drain secondary for pet powers) Purple-pink

 

 (22) Summon King Slime

 You call forth 1 King Slime henchman at your level. When a King Slime dies, two Queen Slimes are spawned for 15 seconds. These slimes cannot be upgraded or controlled. Queen Slimes are the equivalent of King Slimes without any empowerment from skills or enhancements.

 

King Slime starts with:

High Pain Tolerance - (15% resistance to all damage, passive)

*Smash - (melee cone, low damage (smashing), pet elemental secondary*, fast cooldown)

Pop - (short range PBAoE, moderate damage(smashing), pet elemental secondary, moderate cooldown)

                 This power summons two Pawn Slimes for 7 seconds.

Engulf - (melee, moderate DoT(pet elemental damage type*, -speed, -recharge, pet elemental secondary, moderate recharge) 

 

(26) Metalize - Grants further abilities to slimes

All slimes gain:

Elemental resistance: (10% resistance to Fire, Ice, Electric, and Acid damage)

*Slam - (melee, low damage(smashing), pet elemental secondary, fast cooldown)

 

Rook Slimes gain:

*Engulf - (melee, moderate DoT(pet elemental damage type), -speed, -recharge, pet elemental secondary, moderate recharge)

 

King Slimes gain:

*Spatter Ball - (ranged, target based AoE, primary target moderate damage (smashing), all targets moderate damage DoT(pet elemental type), pet elemental secondary, long cooldown)

 

The pet powers can use the following animations

Slimeball - Alkaloid effect from Poison

Slam - Radioactive Smash effect from Radiation Melee

Pseudopod Slam - Contaminated Strike effect from Radiation Melee

Spikes - Spine Burst from Spines

Smash - Radiation Siphon effect from Radiation Melee

Pop - Bubble pop effect from Death From Below Hydra room

Engulf – Doubles size, moves into enemy space, and shrinks before stepping back

Hurl Essence - Hydroblast Effect from Water Blast

Spatter Ball - Water Jet effect from Water Blast

[Psyonico]

I don't know why, but I find this power set suggestion to be amazing and I want something like it to happen nao.

[Jacke]

There's got to be a chance for the Slimes to turn on their Mastermind, mob them, and turn them into Slime.  Whether a rebellion or the ultimate Self-Buff...?

 

 

[TygerDarkstorm]

I think this sounds like a really fun and unique primary for MMs. I have no idea how hard or annoying it would be for the game code to handle the slimes splitting off; I know a lot of players have issue with excess particle effects as is, so it may be something that needs to be compromised on/rethunk.

 

This seems like a powerset you would want to allow for the recoloring of the powers on, so how would that work with your idea to have the Elemental Infusion power change colors? Personalization of powers tends to matter a lot for folks in this game.

 

Thank you for presenting something that seems well thought out and like it could use some existing assets from the game. I keep hoping the HC team will add new primaries for MM's because they're my favorite AT and have the least amount of primaries to choose from.

[Rudra]

I highly recommend losing the splitting slime function. Aside from standard code rant, MMs rely on being able to command their pets. Uncontrolled pets don't function for Bodyguard Mode, and since the split slimes will most likely still count as the appropriate tier pet for summons, they not only decrease the number of pets available for Bodyguard Mode by transitioning to being uncontrolled as Aggressive-Follow pets, they would also prevent replacement pets from being summoned for the extra 15 seconds those uncontrolled slimes exist. I'm also not sure if the Elemental Infusion would work given what we know about the game's code and the fact you are trying to change what your pets do/how they function. You probably also won't get the ability to have your pets spawn more pets even for the low time you posted since you are now looking at a MM that can have up to 18 pets just from their primary power set, that despite being uncontrolled while active, are still every bit as powerful as your 6 standard pets, just without their upgrade powers. (6 pawn slimes from defeated knight slimes, 3 pawn slimes spawned by the knight slimes before defeat, 4 bishop slimes from defeated rook slimes, 2 bishop slimes spawned from the rook slimes before defeat, 2 queen slimes from defeated king slime, and 1 queen slime spawned from the king slime before defeat. [Edit: And if for some reason replacement slimes could be summoned even while their split versions are in play, then you could feasibly have up to 24 pets for a very brief window of time just from the primary power set. The 12 split slimes for however much of their 15 seconds remains, the 6 slimes you summon normally, plus the 6 slimes those replacement slimes summon for 5 seconds each. Especially after you get the recharge rate of Sludge Hurl down so you can focus on just spamming it on every enemy in sight.]) This means this set plays best by not upgrading their pets since the upgrades would slow the rate at which the pets can be defeated, so they can generate more pets faster between replacement summons. Edit again: It also means the MM is best served by not even trying to keep their henchmen tier pets alive with their secondary so they can get more slimes in play faster, freeing them to focus on spamming Sludge Hurl and the occasional pet summon for yet more slimes.

 

Edited December 1 by Rudra

[Jeagan]

8 hours ago, Rudra said:

I highly recommend losing the splitting slime function. 

I'm also not sure if the Elemental Infusion would work given what we know about the game's code and the fact you are trying to change what your pets do/how they function.

Rudra, I see what you're saying, but uncontrollable pets are pretty common in MM powersets. Gang War, the newly added secondary summons from Necromancy's primary attacks and Soul Extraction, etc. The fact these split slimes would be lacking all of the extra attacks granted by the upgrade powers would limit their attack rate and damage potential pretty drastically. Adding to that the fact enhancements don't affect them just compounds that weakness. You would need three Queens just to somewhat equal a single King due to the reduced accuracy, reduced damage, and reduced frequency of attacks.

Ultimately speaking, while I get your hesitation with the potential output, I feel this would be more equivalent to a perma-Gang War build than anything completely game breaking. Sure, there would be a ton of pets, but outside of your primaries they won't really do much beyond distract and deal a small amount of damage.

 

-edit- As far as the Elemental Infusion, it would work similarly to how the Ammunition Change works for Dual Pistols. I have no idea how difficult that would be to program in, but that in and of itself indicates it would be doable.

Edited December 1 by Jeagan
Additional reply

[Jeagan]

9 hours ago, TygerDarkstorm said:

This seems like a powerset you would want to allow for the recoloring of the powers on, so how would that work with your idea to have the Elemental Infusion power change colors? Personalization of powers tends to matter a lot for folks in this game.

Elemental Infusion affects your pets, AFAIK this would be the only MM powerset that lets you customize your pets at all.

[TygerDarkstorm]

2 hours ago, Jeagan said:

Elemental Infusion affects your pets, AFAIK this would be the only MM powerset that lets you customize your pets at all.

But it's a customization you're forcing on the player, not something they can choose for themselves. For example, if I make my slime powerset pink, Elemental Infusion comes in and overrides my color choice.

[Jeagan]

29 minutes ago, TygerDarkstorm said:

But it's a customization you're forcing on the player, not something they can choose for themselves. For example, if I make my slime powerset pink, Elemental Infusion comes in and overrides my color choice.

It only colors the pets, not the other powers. None of the other MM pet sets have customization to the pets, but you can color personal attacks. This wouldn't be any different.

[Rudra]

3 hours ago, Jeagan said:

Rudra, I see what you're saying, but uncontrollable pets are pretty common in MM powersets. Gang War, the newly added secondary summons from Necromancy's primary attacks and Soul Extraction, etc. The fact these split slimes would be lacking all of the extra attacks granted by the upgrade powers would limit their attack rate and damage potential pretty drastically. Adding to that the fact enhancements don't affect them just compounds that weakness. You would need three Queens just to somewhat equal a single King due to the reduced accuracy, reduced damage, and reduced frequency of attacks.

Gang War does not potentially prevent you from summoning replacements for 15 seconds after any of your pets die. Neither do the specters spawned by the MM's inherent attacks from Necromancy. In both cases, when they lose one or more pets, as long as their pet summon power has recharged, the MM player can immediately summon replacements. And those replacements are subject to commands from the MM. Which means they can also almost immediately start soaking damage for the MM.

 

As for the "need three Queens just to somewhat equal a single King" part, that isn't the least bit true. Since you have the the split slimes simply be uncontrolled and unable to be upgraded regular summons, you are still getting up to 6 T1 pets, 4 T2 pets, and 2 T3 pets. Yes, you lose access to enhancement upgrades too, but you aren't losing any combat levels; the splits are still the same level as the originating pet. You aren't gaining any improved accuracy or damage from enhancements, but you are doubling the number of pets. And those pets are still doing normal damage for pets normally summoned, just not enhanced damage from slotted enhancements. And you aren't losing number of attacks per pet with the splits, just access to their added attacks. And you have their attacks at a fast cooldown, so with 2 attacks at say a 4 second recharge each and a 1.5 second animation, they can still maintain an almost constant stream of attacks, just not incorporating any of their upgraded attacks. My main, a ninja mastermind, only gets a +26.5% accuracy boost from a single multi enhancement on the genin. The rest of their accuracy comes from Tactics, which is giving them a +11.81% boost to accuracy. And they only really seem to miss enemies on the highest difficulty settings. (They still manage to land a lot of their attacks even on the highest difficulty settings, just not for much damage.) My Dark Servant from my secondary set isn't even slotted for accuracy, but manages to always land that heal. While the T1 splits will struggle to hit depending on your difficulty settings, the T2 and T3 splits won't have any major problems and you will have 6 of those. One thing I've learned about MMs, when the fighting gets really difficult or bad, the upgrades aren't anywhere near as important as simply getting pets back into the field to fight. And splitting pets upon defeat means you will be getting lots of pets on the field. It also means the MM is best off not trying to protect their pets, but rather gets the best effect by sacrificing pets to get more pets on the field as quickly as possible.

 

And then you get to teams. Can you imagine a full team of just slime MMs? There are already MM only runs for various TFs/SFs (just like there are other AT only runs), and they can have anywhere from 64-72 pets on the field at once depending on their secondaries. This AT could have up to 152 pets on the field at once depending on secondary. So you introduce your own invasion problems to the team, where not everything may be rendered to fight depending on the PC. Yes, this is an extremely niche case, likely never to happen, but it is a possibility to consider.

 

4 hours ago, Jeagan said:

Ultimately speaking, while I get your hesitation with the potential output, I feel this would be more equivalent to a perma-Gang War build than anything completely game breaking. Sure, there would be a ton of pets, but outside of your primaries they won't really do much beyond distract and deal a small amount of damage.

Gang War does not even summon pets as capable as your T1s, and yet it has a 10 minute cooldown.

[Jeagan]

I'm not sure why you think the temp pets would lock you out of re-summoning replacements of the main pets, that's a non-sequitur that powers activated by my pets would make my pet summon power unusable. If my pyromaniac henchman lights a dude on fire, can I not summon him until that DoT fades?

 

As far as needing more of the temporary versions of the pets to equal a single one of the original, just look at the pawn slime vs the knight slime.

Pawn Slime attacks
    Slimeball
    Slam

Knight Slime attacks (fully upgraded)
    Slimeball
    2 copies of Slam, so it literally cycles twice as often
    Pseudopod Slam
    Spikes
    Engulf

If I just have the Knight Slime enhanced to hit 10% more often, and have 50% increased damage with the same moves, that is a heck of a lot more output than the Pawn Slime. It hits more, and deals more damage per hit. If the Pawn hits 50% of the time, and deals 50 damage on a hit, while the Knight hits 60% of the time and deals 75 damage, over the course of 10 attacks (assuming both have the same powersets and recharge rates) the pawn deals 250 damage (5 of the 10 attacks at 50 damage each) while the Knight deals 450 damage (6 of the 10 attacks at 75 damage each). That's almost double. Now toss in all of the additional attacks on top of that, it's pretty obvious that yes, you would need three of the lesser to equal one of the major.

 

You're also assuming there is no limit to how many pets can be summoned per henchman. I would assume there will be, but I don't know how that would need to be balanced. I don't have specific numbers for damage, accuracy, or anything like that because that would require a ton of playtesting to balance out.

Edited December 1 by Jeagan
added the math for the damage output comparisons

[Rudra]

25 minutes ago, Jeagan said:

If I just have the Knight Slime enhanced to hit 10% more often, and have 50% increased damage with the same moves, that is a heck of a lot more output than the Pawn Slime. It hits more, and deals more damage per hit. If the Pawn hits 50% of the time, and deals 50 damage on a hit, while the Knight hits 60% of the time and deals 75 damage, over the course of 10 attacks (assuming both have the same powersets and recharge rates) the pawn deals 250 damage (5 of the 10 attacks at 50 damage each) while the Knight deals 450 damage (6 of the 10 attacks at 75 damage each). That's almost double. Now toss in all of the additional attacks on top of that, it's pretty obvious that yes, you would need three of the lesser to equal one of the major.

Except you are discounting that they can each only make 1 attack at a time. And with a fast recharge, even not upgraded, they can maintain a near constant stream of attacks. And you are also ignoring that you have twice as many pawns as knights. So your 250 becomes 500. One knight dealing out 450 damage per hit breaks up into two pawns doing 250 damage each for 500 damage total between them. And with fast attacks, they can keep those attacks coming. And if you can summon replacements despite having the splits in play still, then now you jump up to 950 between the 3 of them. And if you don't upgrade the knight to keep his resists down and you don't support the knight with your secondary to keep him alive, you will be nearly constantly generating new pawns, doing more damage than your knight.

 

Edit: And as for why you wouldn't be able to summon replacements while the splits are active? Lets take just the knights. You summon 3 knights. They die and become 6 pawns, so you immediately summon 3 knights. Which die and become more 6 pawns. Depending on how many pawns survived and haven't timed out from the previous run, you have up to 12 pawns now. And you can still summon 3 more knights.

 

Edited December 1 by Rudra

[Jeagan]

5 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Except you are discounting that they can each only make 1 attack at a time. And with a fast recharge, even not upgraded, they can maintain a near constant stream of attacks. And you are also ignoring that you have twice as many pawns as knights. So your 250 becomes 500. One knight dealing out 450 damage per hit breaks up into two pawns doing 250 damage each for 500 damage total between them. And with fast attacks, they can keep those attacks coming.

 

None of that is taking into account that those fast hits do not deal as much damage as the later attacks. You proved my point that one non-upgraded knight and two pawns are about equal. Upgraded knights have stronger hitting attacks that allow a more constant steam of attacks (1 per second vs 1 per 3 seconds) that also hit AoEs (Spikes) and other effects. Let's compare just adding in that second cycle of Slam to the mix. Same time frame assume 3 second cooldown, 50 damage base, 50% to hit base. Knight gets +10% acc and +50% dam.

 

Pawn: Over 30 seconds, gets 10 attacks. Half of them hit, so 5. 50 damage each, so 250 damage. We'll say 3 slimes are out, so 750 damage.

Knight: Over 30 seconds, gets 20 attacks (double cycle of the same attack). 60% hit, so 12. 12*75 = 900 damage.

 

Just adding in that one additional attack still has the single knight outpacing three pawns on damage. To tie back to the Gang War MM, if you really want to sacrifice you Punk for three Posse, go for it, I guess. I doubt 18 posse are as effective as 3 punks, and I really doubt you'll be cycling that often, seeing how the summon pet powers have a cooldown that's about as long as the temp pets last.

[Monos King]

One of my favorite mastermind concepts I've seen. The split slime function sounds amazing, it's the kind of uniqueness that draws people to MMs to begin with. Whether or not it would end up being too potent would be the main concern, but we play MMs to get as many pets as possible. Big fan.

 

It is highly unlikely another -res MM would be permitted, so maybe it would have to be limited to a single power if that stays. It would be cool to see more uncommon debuffs like -special, -debuff res, -endurance strength and the like. 

 

Elemental infusion is a very cool idea, a sort of swap ammo for the pets. I would also not be opposed to a power that simply summons all possible slime splits (like forcing the main pets to die but without killing them) for an effect similar to current necromancy Soul Extraction. And, if when used, the split-slime summons are already active, it could even merge them to create a powerful elemental slime. That's just my pitch though. This set is thematically malleable and could be magic, tech, or any character origin, which is important. It's a good draft for a set, +1

Edited December 1 by Monos King
+1

[Jeagan]

If it helps, I have a breakdown of Zombie using this same type of math.

Zombie Brawl is the only attack they have without an upgrade. It deals 50 damage and has a cooldown of 4 seconds. This means it can be used 15 times in one minute.

With a 50% hit rate, this averages out to a total of 375 (60*15*0.5) damage over a full minute, and if there are three it is a total of 1125 damage. We'll use this as our "Pawn" scale.

 

Our "Knight" zombies have +50% damage, +10% accuracy to their powers.
Zombie Brawl: 50 damage (upping to 75 for the enhancement bonus), 4 second cooldown. 75 damage * 15 uses * 0.6 accuracy gives us 562.5 damage.

Projectile Vomit: 40 damage (upping to 60 for the enhancement bonus), 12 second cooldown. 60 damage * 5 uses * 0.6 accuracy gives us 180 damage.

Vomit: 50 damage (upping to 75), 12 second cooldown. 75 * 5 * 0.6 = 225

Siphon Life: 25 damage (37.5), 10 second cooldown. 37.5 * 6 * 0.6 = 135

Grand total damage over a full minute is 562.5+180+225+135, or 1102.5.

 

Zombie's summon power has a 5 second cooldown, so at most you will get maybe three "pawns" per "knight" on the field at once. I don't see this as an issue, it's kind of the intent behind the power set, and it doesn't seem broken. Just have the base slime powers (as in the ones they have without any upgrades apply) not as powerful as the standard henchman powers, and that problem is entirely removed.

[Rudra]

13 minutes ago, Jeagan said:

None of that is taking into account that those fast hits do not deal as much damage as the later attacks. You proved my point that one non-upgraded knight and two pawns are about equal. Upgraded knights have stronger hitting attacks that allow a more constant steam of attacks (1 per second vs 1 per 3 seconds) that also hit AoEs (Spikes) and other effects. Let's compare just adding in that second cycle of Slam to the mix. Same time frame assume 3 second cooldown, 50 damage base, 50% to hit base. Knight gets +10% acc and +50% dam.

 

Pawn: Over 30 seconds, gets 10 attacks. Half of them hit, so 5. 50 damage each, so 250 damage. We'll say 3 slimes are out, so 750 damage.

Knight: Over 30 seconds, gets 20 attacks (double cycle of the same attack). 60% hit, so 12. 12*75 = 900 damage.

 

Just adding in that one additional attack still has the single knight outpacing three pawns on damage. To tie back to the Gang War MM, if you really want to sacrifice you Punk for three Posse, go for it, I guess. I doubt 18 posse are as effective as 3 punks, and I really doubt you'll be cycling that often, seeing how the summon pet powers have a cooldown that's about as long as the temp pets last.

You're not factoring the animation times. Your bigger attacks will hit harder, yes, but it works out better for the player to not bother giving the pets those bigger powers. Those bigger powers also have longer animations and longer recharge times. Both the pawns and the knights have the exact same attacks with the exact same animation times and the exact same recharge times. Yes, the knights will get a faster recharge with their enhancements, but they still run up against the wall of only 1 attack at a time and having to get through their attack animation before starting the next one. So if you don't upgrade the knights, you can more than double their damage without bothering to enhance them for it simply by making sure they die as expediently as possible and you can re-summon them as soon as possible. And without Hasten, I can get the T1 summon down to available every 9 seconds. On a 15 second timer, how many pawns and knights can you stack at once?

 

Using your 30 second time frame, running with 1.5 second animations on a 4 second recharge for 2 attacks at base pet:

Pawn: 12 attacks over 30 seconds at 50 damage each. 12 x 50 = 600. Only half will hit, but you do have twice the number of pawns for a total of 600 damage.

                1.5 second attack usable every 4 seconds at two such attacks.

                Each attack has a 2.5 second window of non-availability.

                Each attack is used in the non-availability window of the other attack.

                Between both attacks, there is a combined 2 second window where the pawn has no attacks. 5 total seconds for the combined sequence.

                30/5=6 cycles of two attacks each for a total of 12 attacks in a 30 second time frame.

Knight: 20 attacks over 30 seconds at 75 damage each. 20 x 75 = 1,500. Only 60% of your hits land though. 1,500 x 0.6 = 900.

                1.5 second attack usable every 3 seconds at two such attacks (to avoid the complication of factoring in the upgrade attacks).

                Each attack has a 1.5 second window of non-availability.

                Each attack fills the non-availability window of the other attack.

                Between both attacks, you have a combined 2 attacks per 3 seconds without pause.

                30/3=10 cycles of two attacks each for a total of 20 attacks.

 

So factoring in enhancements, the knights do 1.5x the damage of the pawns. (So yes, you would need 3 pawns to match the damage of a knight.)

 

Now add in the extra complication of you can summon more knights while the pawns are in play, and those knights can die to spawn two more pawns each. And then add in the complication of each knight can spawn a pawn without dying through the Sludge Hurl ability that you are spamming on everything when you aren't summoning more slimes, even if they only last for 5 seconds and so get off 2 attacks tops. Do you see how this cascades? And this is without even considering the game's notorious spaghetti code or how old the game engine is.

[Jeagan]

It seems like the easiest solution for your concern is to just make the initial pet powers, meaning the ones they have without any upgrades, be a bit weaker than the average. Having the temp pets would balance out the henchmen being weaker early game (basically until you get Viscosity) and the numbers would keep them viable through the endgame. If Slam does 50 base damage and Pseudopod does 100, then that 50% damage bonus will affect the weight of the henchman slimes even more.

[Rudra]

Just now, Jeagan said:

It seems like the easiest solution for your concern is to just make the initial pet powers, meaning the ones they have without any upgrades, be a bit weaker than the average. Having the temp pets would balance out the henchmen being weaker early game (basically until you get Viscosity) and the numbers would keep them viable through the endgame. If Slam does 50 base damage and Pseudopod does 100, then that 50% damage bonus will affect the weight of the henchman slimes even more.

I would personally recommend either dropping the splitting slime function and just retain the extra slime spawning ability, or change the summoned split slimes to not be the same as the summoning dead pet. Will this hamstring the split slimes? Yes, however, provided the game's code can handle the splitting function in the first place, having say Underling tier pets spawned from the Henchman tier pets' defeats would at least give the player incentive to upgrade their pets and keep them alive, while still retaining the ability to get more pets from your pets' defeat. Since you envision this as a perma-Gang War, and considering that Gang War's pets only last a few minutes on a 10 minute timer, cutting down the split slimes' capabilities would make it easier to justify the sheer number of pets your proposal can generate.

[Jeagan]

8 minutes ago, Rudra said:

 And without Hasten, I can get the T1 summon down to available every 9 seconds. On a 15 second timer, how many pawns and knights can you stack at once?

 

I missed this the first read-through, and I'd like to directly address it. Applying -rech to your pet means they won't have the extra damage and accuracy, and would essentially be equivalent to the pawns, so your overall damage would drop.

 

Assuming your kinghts are all summoned and you have summon ready to go, all three knights die, you have 6 temps. Activate power, nine seconds to go. All the knights die instantly, so you have 12 temps with a full 15 second lifespan. Assuming none of the temps die to damage, you can summon all three knights a third time after nine seconds, having a total of 18. 12 of those will already have been out for 9 seconds, so 3 seconds before you can summon any more knights, you're back down to 6 temps.

 

I don't see this as an issue. If you want to focus more on having a bunch of temps out, it will weaken the henchman themselves, so instead of doing about the same amount of damage, they are doing half. I don't see how this is preferable.

[Rudra]

5 minutes ago, Jeagan said:

Assuming your kinghts are all summoned and you have summon ready to go, all three knights die, you have 6 temps. Activate power, nine seconds to go. All the knights die instantly, so you have 12 temps with a full 15 second lifespan. Assuming none of the temps die to damage, you can summon all three knights a third time after nine seconds, having a total of 18. 12 of those will already have been out for 9 seconds, so 3 seconds before you can summon any more knights, you're back down to 6 temps.

You summon before the fight. After the fight starts, you aren't anywhere near that 9 second recharge any more. Knights die, you immediately summon more and have 6 pawns on the field. If those knights die, you have possibly 12 pawns and can summon 3 more knights 9 seconds into the fight. Timed right, this means you can have up to 3 knights and 15 pawns for maybe 3 seconds. Where are the extra 3 pawns coming from? The knights hit a target affected by Sludge Hurl.

 

(Edit: This of course assumes that the pawns are miraculously surviving where the knights are not somehow.)

 

Edited December 1 by Rudra

[Jeagan]

4 minutes ago, Rudra said:

You summon before the fight. After the fight starts, you aren't anywhere near that 9 second recharge any more. Knights die, you immediately summon more and have 6 pawns on the field. If those knights die, you have possibly 12 pawns and can summon 3 more knights 9 seconds into the fight. Timed right, this means you can have up to 3 knights and 15 pawns for maybe 3 seconds. Where are the extra 3 pawns coming from? The knights hit a target affected by Sludge Hurl.

 

(Edit: This of course assumes that the pawns are miraculously surviving where the knights are not somehow.)

 

I was operating under the same assumptions you were. Three knights, fully recharged power. Knights die the instant they spawn in, and the pawns are all invulnerable.

Knights die, so 6 pawns. Summon, knights die again, so 6+6 pawns. Nine seconds later, summon knights, which instantly die. Now you have 12 pawns that have 6 seconds left (9 second cooldown) and 6 freshly summoned pawns, so 12+6. That's 18 pawns.

Six seconds later you lose 12 pawns, so you have 6 left. Three seconds after that you summon and instantly lose your knights, bringing in another 6 pawns, for a total of 12.

[Rudra]

1 minute ago, Jeagan said:

I was operating under the same assumptions you were. Three knights, fully recharged power. Knights die the instant they spawn in, and the pawns are all invulnerable.

Knights die, so 6 pawns. Summon, knights die again, so 6+6 pawns. Nine seconds later, summon knights, which instantly die. Now you have 12 pawns that have 6 seconds left (9 second cooldown) and 6 freshly summoned pawns, so 12+6. That's 18 pawns.

Six seconds later you lose 12 pawns, so you have 6 left. Three seconds after that you summon and instantly lose your knights, bringing in another 6 pawns, for a total of 12.

Plus the three the knights can summon when they get their one attack in before dying. Even at only 5 second duration, they are still additional pawns capable of launching up to 2 attacks during their window of existence.

[Jeagan]

The posse is about equivalent to what I'm thinking for my pawns, honestly. They have one attack, compared to the two that Punks start with, but the damage ends up being very comparable.

 

Posse Brawl
28.80 average damage
2 second cooldown

 

Punk Pistol
29.68 average damage
2 second cooldown

Punk Brawl
32.06 average damage
16 second cooldown

[TygerDarkstorm]

5 hours ago, Jeagan said:

It only colors the pets, not the other powers. None of the other MM pet sets have customization to the pets, but you can color personal attacks. This wouldn't be any different.

Slime pets, presumably, would be colorable since they seemingly would be able to be on models that allow for that sort of thing, which would mean Elemental Infusion would override the colors of the powers chosen for your pets. Unless your plan is to have the slimes not be recolored to fit in with the powers. I may have over-thought it by assuming the slimes would recolor like the other powers, but I suppose there isn't current precedence for that among current MM primaries. If it's that case, then the Infusion would potentially override the player's chosen colors if the upgrade powers give the slimes auras like Necro and Beasts get.

 

Regardless, I mentioned it purely as something to think about because customization is important to a lot of folks in this game and Elemental Infusion sorta forces them to have their henchies look a certain way if they were otherwise allowed to be colored differently. It may also be a more minor issue than I think. 🤷‍♀️

 

I still like the general concept of the powerset. I do think that the slime splitting off thing would probably have to be scrapped/re-thought out, but otherwise it's a nicely thought out suggestion that seems like it could be fun.

[Jeagan]

12 minutes ago, TygerDarkstorm said:

I still like the general concept of the powerset. I do think that the slime splitting off thing would probably have to be scrapped/re-thought out, but otherwise it's a nicely thought out suggestion that seems like it could be fun.

I think people are overthinking this a lot, if the damage of the base powers is balanced against having the temps out it shouldn't be all that big of a deal. Have the basic powers of the henchman, meaning the powers they start with, be weaker than the ones other henchmen types start with, and have the upgrade powers which the temp pets don't get access to be slightly stronger. Then the temps deal less damage, while the henchmen are still on the average damage curve. There are a bunch of ways to adjust for the additional damage, especially considering the temporary pets cannot be enhanced in any way.

Edited December 1 by Jeagan