Please make MM upgrade powers passive

[kwsapphire]

2 hours ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

So here's the problem.

 

If the devs take any steps to make MMs minions more durable, a subject that was very popular last year, it essentially ruins the /Sonic and /FF secondaries. Making the upgrades faster, or making them automatic or passives, has much the same effect. Sure, it doesn't keep them alive longer, it just makes replacing them quick and painless. Either of those two things changes the MM game play loop and increases the MMs DPS.

 

If you don't want to be constantly resummoning and/or upgrading your minions then take action to keep them from dying. Place them in a spot that makes them less vulnerable to the enemy, give them inspirations, heal them, take the /Sonic or FF secondaries to make them tougher, team up with a tank, etc.

 

There are a lot of ways you can make your minions more durable, and prevent from having to constantly resummon and upgrade them, other than just asking the devs to buff them.

 

 

Great point! You've solved the whole suggestions forum. The Homecoming team can go ahead and shut this whole section down. No need for anyone to ever suggest anything again, since we can all take actions to mitigate whatever issues we happen to have with this game. BRILLIANT. 

[Col. Kernel]

On 3/14/2025 at 10:54 AM, PeregrineFalcon said:

Well, I got lucky. I expected to spend nearly an hour searching for it, especially since I couldn't remember who said it or when.

 

Here's a weird coincidence. When I posted yesterday that the devs had already said that, it was four years to the day after he'd said it.

In case I didn't already say it, thanks for digging that up.

[Col. Kernel]

On 3/14/2025 at 11:41 AM, PeregrineFalcon said:

It's part of the challenge of playing a Mastermind. It's also why my two favorite MMs are /FF, so that I'm not having to constantly resummon my minions.

 

So you take FF specifically to avoid that challenge.  Because MMs don't have enough challenges already, like leaving half their HP scattered across the zone behind them when they travel.  And if you have the audacity to mention Group Fly I'll laugh in your face.

 

On 3/14/2025 at 11:41 AM, PeregrineFalcon said:

Personally I think it's a good thing that the various ATs are so different, there's an AT out there for everyone.

You say you're glad the ATs are so different (as am I) but you also state that your favorite MM secondary prevents the problem I'm wanting solved.

I like the buff/debuff secondaries, they are all wildly different.  But to have one secondary (or 2 if you count Sonic) that fixes a flaw in the AT design while snubbing the others seems unjust.

[Col. Kernel]

On 3/14/2025 at 12:55 PM, Rudra said:

Also, as a heads up in case anyone is unaware, if you are having problems targeting one of your pets for anything? Whether an upgrade or a heal or any other reason? Simply click them in the pet window and it selects them.

Ahh yes.  Because that is so ridiculously easy to do in the middle of combat.

I'm micromanaging the pets because if I don't they'll run off and aggro another spawn.

[PeregrineFalcon]

6 minutes ago, Col. Kernel said:

But to have one secondary (or 2 if you count Sonic) that fixes a flaw in the AT design while snubbing the others seems unjust.

It's not a design flaw, it was done on purpose.

 

You can take a secondary like /dark or /poison that includes powers that do damage and increase your damage output, or you can take /Son or /FF, which focus more on defense.

[Col. Kernel]

On 3/16/2025 at 12:35 PM, Rudra said:

And yet yesterday, I spent a good portion of the day on my Ninja/Dark MM doing the Organ Grinders Flashback doing exactly that at +0/x3. I entered the missions, turned on Walk, and walked through the missions. Only on 1 mission did I have to turn off Walk and support my pets because I got jumped by 3 groups of Rikti on a sewer map.

 

If your team stays together in the crates/containers part of the mission? You most definitely can keep your pets alive. If they scatter? Then let them. Do what you can or just go prepare for Marauder's arrival.

I'll believe you when I see the video of that run.

[Snarky]

On 3/12/2025 at 9:24 PM, Rudra said:

Sure. I do that with my Corruptors routinely every time I team with my friends. That said, why the hostility?

 

Edit: Sorry, you said every 3rd fight. No, I tend to do that much more frequently than every 3rd fight.

 

Edit again: Besides, per the other threads requesting this, the devs have already stated they won't be making MM pet upgrades passive or automatic.

 

 

Unfair comparison.  Corruptors have so many good options in a fight that you almost have to drop a few things to concentrate on the most important for that fight.  
 

What I am saying, is Corruptors are better than MMs.   In case anyone missed that.  

[Col. Kernel]

12 hours ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

There are a lot of ways you can make your minions more durable, and prevent from having to constantly resummon and upgrade them, other than just asking the devs to buff them.

1)  I expect high casualties on the T1s

2)  I expect casualties on the T2s

Now, from a gameplay standpoint, what is the difference between preventing those casualties and recovering from those casualties?

If preventing the casualties is the only option I'm limited to Thermal, Cold, FF, and Sonic secondaries, or Robotics primary.  That means that, for the sake of keeping myself sane, I don't get to play all the other wonderful secondaries the devs have created.

 

Whereas, if the change I requested is made, now the secondaries all have valid, but different gameloops.

[Col. Kernel]

13 hours ago, srmalloy said:

And I just finished going through all of my Mastermind bind files to preface the binds for the upgrades with '+targetcustomnear alive mypet$$' to make the bind target the nearest pet, eliminating the need to double-tap the first use to target a pet. I can corroborate from testing with my Necromancy/Marine Mastermind that I can run through the Skeleton/Grave Knight/Lich summons, then slap the first empowerment on a Skeleton while the Lich is still untargetable, and the Lich gets the empowerment.

Now that (bolded above) is the second useful piece of information I've gotten from this three page thread.  And that's my bad, I don't use "targetcustom near" enough.

Honorable Mention to @Snarky for stating an obvious truth.

[battlewraith]

18 minutes ago, Col. Kernel said:

I'll believe you when I see the video of that run.

I'm curious as to whether dark servant was part of the equation. The ninjas + a powerful pet from the only secondary I think that offers a pet.

Yeah I could see that rolling through low difficulty settings.

[kwsapphire]

23 minutes ago, battlewraith said:

I'm curious as to whether dark servant was part of the equation. The ninjas + a powerful pet from the only secondary I think that offers a pet.

Yeah I could see that rolling through low difficulty settings.

 

Dark Servant had to have been the deciding factor there. Except Rudra insists that this is possible with "any" primary and secondary. Which, given my personal experience, I find utterly impossible to believe. 

 

Whatever. As long as newbie MMs don't come into this thread thinking they can replicate an impossibility, I'm done. 

[Doc_Scorpion]

 

35 minutes ago, Col. Kernel said:

If preventing the casualties is the only option I'm limited to Thermal, Cold, FF, and Sonic secondaries, or Robotics primary.  That means that, for the sake of keeping myself sane, I don't get to play all the other wonderful secondaries the devs have created.

There are multiple ways to mitigate damage and death/destruction among your pets.  You can buff them, or you can heal them.  Or you can debuff the mobs.  Or you can take a more offensive stance and assist them in destroying the mobs before your pets can become casualties.  There are no secondaries that don't have valid playstyles.

Your personal preferences among those playstyles or inability to master them is not a reason to change the fundamental gameplay loop of the archetype.

[PeregrineFalcon]

58 minutes ago, Col. Kernel said:

If preventing the casualties is the only option I'm limited to Thermal, Cold, FF, and Sonic secondaries, or Robotics primary.  That means that, for the sake of keeping myself sane, I don't get to play all the other wonderful secondaries the devs have created.

There are other options that allow you to keep your pets alive while also not using just the more defensive secondaries. Of those options my favorite is to team up with a Tank or a Brute and let them draw aggro before ordering my NPC minions to attack.

[battlewraith]

59 minutes ago, Doc_Scorpion said:

Your personal preferences among those playstyles or inability to master them is not a reason to change the fundamental gameplay loop of the archetype.

 

I played a //ff controller back at release. I had to refresh bubbles on people periodically, or just decide I wasn't going to be bothered. This was not a difficult thing to "master." It was just irritating. And eventually they changed it so that it hit everything at once--thus changing the game loop of the set. As far as I can tell, those controllers and defenders affected did not suddenly become significantly more powerful or valued on team. They just became funner to play.

 

People keep saying "well if you know what you're doing, the pets shouldn't be getting killed."

Okay, well if it's the norm that the pets stay alive--if that's the standard expectation--then objecting to this proposal makes no sense because you're not going to see a big increase in dps if the upgrades became passive. The primary source of damage, the pets, are assumed to be a constant in either case. So if it's that trivial to keep them alive, this doesn't constitute a major change in gameloop. 

 

If on the other hand, it is actually normal for the pets to die in the course of something approaching a meaningfully challenging mission, then this proposal is a dps increase. But that increase is only to the floor of what people here seem to be expecting as standard dps. It does not constitute an increase to the ceiling to what the AT is already accomplishing. 

Edited Tuesday at 04:30 PM by battlewraith

[Rudra]

3 hours ago, Col. Kernel said:

Because MMs don't have enough challenges already, like leaving half their HP scattered across the zone behind them when they travel.

MMs never leave their HP anywhere unless it is from taking damage. Pets aren't more HP. They are extra damage mitigation, but only while in Bodyguard Mode with the pets in Supremacy range. You aren't losing any HP when you set pets to Aggressive or Passive, just changing what you are having those pets do.

 

3 hours ago, Col. Kernel said:

You say you're glad the ATs are so different (as am I) but you also state that your favorite MM secondary prevents the problem I'm wanting solved.

I like the buff/debuff secondaries, they are all wildly different.  But to have one secondary (or 2 if you count Sonic) that fixes a flaw in the AT design while snubbing the others seems unjust.

All MM secondaries can prevent having to re-summon and re-upgrade. Some are easier to do that with than others. What you are calling a flaw in the AT is intentional game design to keep MMs balanced in relation to other ATs. The only "flaw" MMs have is when you get into the Advanced Modes of play or specific TFs/SFs or missions where you face EBs or AVs with multiple high damage AoEs or run up against groups on higher difficulty settings where you get inundated with lots of high damage AoEs and protecting the pets becomes less a task or even a challenge, and more of how quickly can you spam those summon clicks. In which case forget about the upgrades and just focus on drowning the target(s) in a sea of followers.

 

3 hours ago, Col. Kernel said:

Ahh yes.  Because that is so ridiculously easy to do in the middle of combat.

I'm micromanaging the pets because if I don't they'll run off and aggro another spawn.

Welcome to playing MMs. That micromanaging is part of the AT design. So is on the fly healing, buffing, and even upgrading.

 

2 hours ago, Col. Kernel said:

I'll believe you when I see the video of that run.

Feel free to join me any time. Bring a Stalker, stay Hidden, don't attack or even sneeze in the enemies' direction, and stay out of enemy attack radius. Enjoy the show as I slowly walk through the mission.

 

2 hours ago, Col. Kernel said:

 

If preventing the casualties is the only option I'm limited to Thermal, Cold, FF, and Sonic secondaries, or Robotics primary.  That means that, for the sake of keeping myself sane, I don't get to play all the other wonderful secondaries the devs have created.

Then learn how to better leverage those secondaries. Or continue not using those secondaries. There are MM secondaries I simply won't use. Like Poison which one of my friends swears is the best MM secondary and uses prolifically on her MMs.

 

2 hours ago, Col. Kernel said:

Whereas, if the change I requested is made, now the secondaries all have valid, but different gameloops.

They already do. They just don't have game play loops you prefer,

 

2 hours ago, kwsapphire said:

Dark Servant had to have been the deciding factor there. Except Rudra insists that this is possible with "any" primary and secondary. Which, given my personal experience, I find utterly impossible to believe. 

If you summon your pets and then turn on Walk and don't click any other powers? Guess what you don't get access to? Dark Servant. Because even if you summon the servant before starting to Walk? It times out after four minutes and goes away, so you would then have to drop Walk and click the power to summon a new Dark Servant. And the whole point of taking a lazy day and just Walking through missions is to not have to do anything other than move and click glowies. Yes, if the map is unfavorable and I wind up being attacked by multiple spawns at once. I drop Walk and use my powers to support my pets. And if it is bad enough, that also means summoning the Dark Servant. Otherwise? No, you don't need the Dark Servant any more than you need any other power.

[srmalloy]

2 hours ago, Col. Kernel said:

Now that (bolded above) is the second useful piece of information I've gotten from this three page thread.  And that's my bad, I don't use "targetcustom near" enough.

From the numpad MM control binds, an example from the 'robotics' general bind file (the rest of the general bind files follow the same format for the bind):

add powexec_name "+targetcustomnear alive mypet$$equip robot"
numpadenter powexec_name "+targetcustomnear alive mypet$$upgrade robot"

 

[Col. Kernel]

2 hours ago, Doc_Scorpion said:

There are multiple ways to mitigate damage and death/destruction among your pets.  You can buff them, or you can heal them.  Or you can debuff the mobs.  Or you can take a more offensive stance and assist them in destroying the mobs before your pets can become casualties.  There are no secondaries that don't have valid playstyles.

Your personal preferences among those playstyles or inability to master them is not a reason to change the fundamental gameplay loop of the archetype.

 

Oh, now it's my inability to master playstyles with buffing and debuffing is it?

I'm a member of the Repeat Offenders, and have been since Live.  The Devs have heard of us, even if you haven't.

 

I assure you that a fully IO'd Barrier Reef combined with a fully IO'd Soothing Wave is insufficient to keep my Zombies alive, even when combined with the rest of the buffs from Marine Affinity.

I don't recall my henchmen dying right and left on my Bots/Traps MM, but then again that character has FFG combined with the ProBots shielding, backed up with the Maintenance bot.

I could continue but you get the general idea.

I have not played every MM primary with every MM secondary, I'm sure there are some (e.g. Bots/Traps) where there is a good synergy that results in minimal dead henchmen.  Unfortunately, playing MMs is less fun that playing most of my other characters due to QoL issues like the one in this thread, so it will probably be quite some time before I get to even play every secondary on MMs.

 

In closing, if you can't keep your speech civil (and I assure you that your little "lrn2play n00b" dig was not civil), it would be best if you bowed out of the conversation gracefully.

[Col. Kernel]

2 hours ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

There are other options that allow you to keep your pets alive while also not using just the more defensive secondaries. Of those options my favorite is to team up with a Tank or a Brute and let them draw aggro before ordering my NPC minions to attack.

I'm discussing the utility and QoL of playing an MM, not the benefits of teaming.

My general preference is to team with others, but that's not what we are discussing here.

[Doc_Scorpion]

4 hours ago, battlewraith said:

People keep saying "well if you know what you're doing, the pets shouldn't be getting killed."

Some people keep saying that, not everyone, not even close.  Those people are full of stuff suitable for enriching garden soil.  While it's desirable to keep them alive, the measure of success of an MM is not the number of dead (or surviving) pets or their upgrade levels.  It's whether or not the mob(s) are down and the MM themselves are still standing at the end of the fight.

Pets are disposable and replaceable.

[Rudra]

Here, have a demorecording.

 

I kept it short because waiting for henchmen to heal up for the next fight makes for a very long video.

neko.cohdemo

[Riverdusk]

8 hours ago, Snarky said:

Unfair comparison.  Corruptors have so many good options in a fight that you almost have to drop a few things to concentrate on the most important for that fight.  
 

What I am saying, is Corruptors are better than MMs.   In case anyone missed that.  

 

On a team I'd agree with you.  Better buff values and you tend to have protections with teammates. 

 

Solo?  I tend to stay alive better and kill faster on my MM's than on corruptors.  Maybe I just don't know how to play corruptors though, and I'm being serious, maybe just not my thing.  I have probably a dozen 50 MM's, I think I have managed one 50 corrupter in all my time playing.

[Snarky]

Just now, Riverdusk said:

 

On a team I'd agree with you.  Better buff values and you tend to have protections with teammates. 

 

Solo?  I tend to stay alive better and kill faster on my MM's than on corruptors.  Maybe I just don't know how to play corruptors though, and I'm being serious, maybe just not my thing.  I have probably a dozen 50 MM's, I think I have managed one 50 corrupter in all my time playing.

you are prob right solo.  but i only solo (obsessively) to do story arcs.  and that is not hard to survive.  also, i am terrible at MMs lol.

 

as i pointed out, it was unfair.  every corruptor is an "S" class character in this game.  every single one.  then, depending on content, you have the "perfect" teammate with the right sets.  but no other archetype in the game is just as overall strong.  

[Riverdusk]

13 minutes ago, Snarky said:

you are prob right solo.  but i only solo (obsessively) to do story arcs.  and that is not hard to survive.  also, i am terrible at MMs lol.

 

as i pointed out, it was unfair.  every corruptor is an "S" class character in this game.  every single one.  then, depending on content, you have the "perfect" teammate with the right sets.  but no other archetype in the game is just as overall strong.  

 

I solo probably 75% of the time.  Good example of why different people are going to have different rankings, as their goals and playstyles are different.  A strength of the game really. 

[battlewraith]

16 hours ago, Rudra said:

I kept it short because waiting for henchmen to heal up for the next fight makes for a very long video.

 

So the key to success is not dark servant. It's an even more powerful entity...Father Time.

[Mystoc]

MM's are just to slow for current day teams who often advertise speed TFs in LFG and clunky they are the master of solo play where they set their own pace though.

 

in maps with tight one door entrances like offices or sewers the henchmen just run into walls and don't path correctly, and you are just babysitting them constantly, MMs issue is the not survivability at all, its the pets being too slow for teams with awful AI, and the power pool options to make them faster make teamates mad at you.

 

MM henchmen do not have a survival problem at all with inspcombine for respites and heal MM isnpexecpet commands my pets almost never die here is an example, take out aid other if you don't use it

 

Spoiler

/bind Q "petcom follow$$petcom Passive$$powexecname Aid Other$$inspexecpettarget Respite$$inspexecpettarget Dramatic_Improvement$$inspexecpettarget Resurgence"

 

this puts the targeted pet on passive and forces them to run to away from combat to where you are while also using a health inspiration on them right away and once they get closer you use aid other on them too, this will heal any henchmen to full.

 

 

Edited yesterday at 04:58 PM by Mystoc