page 3 [FOCUSED FEEDBACK] Mastermind Archetype Adjustments

[mechahamham]

A thought about the henchman upgrade powers. They all have zero recharge time and a moderate endurance cost. Even if you chain cast an upgrade on already summoned minions, it takes a bit for it to deplete your endurance bar.

 

At this point, why are the upgrades not auto/passive powers?

[Captain Powerhouse]

9 minutes ago, mechahamham said:

At this point, why are the upgrades not auto/passive powers?

 

For one, the way these upgrades are implemented (especially when you zone) is a hard-coded mess (not unlike many other things in the game). Like, the game remembers you summoned your pets but it applies the pet buffs literally by executing these powers on all your henchmen every time you zone, because the pet upgrades are not really saved to the server alongside the bits that tell the server your pets are summoned.

 

There has also been resistance from multiple dev team members that keeping your henchmen alive should be one of the responsibilities of the MM. If they simply get summoned with all the upgrades, the cost of resummoning them becomes too trivial. This is not any one person's opinion, but unless multiple people in the dev team can be sold on a concession/middle ground, it's not likely to change anytime soon. Even if a pitch was agreed upon today, it would not be part of this page. I am middle of the road on this stance, personally.

 

I have personally considered a few potential pitches, like having henchmen gain strength the longer they are "on the payroll" (summoned) or have auto-upgrades apply on a delay, but so far these are just concepts of a plan to discuss internally.

 

Note (not a reply to anyone in particular) I will try to work today on a post trying to clarify many of the impacts of this patch. There is a chance I won't be able to have that post ready until late tomorrow or Friday, though, due to RL stuff and other dev stuff I'm ironing out right now.

[Vinceq99]

6 hours ago, Dispari said:

As Maelwys said, the intent doesn't seem to be to nerf MMs. It would be nonsensical, as they're right now just not a very good AT (even if some might argue they excel in some niche scenarios). We had a lot of back and forth in beta trying to narrow down the math so that they aren't coming out worse than they currently are on live, since that would defeat the purpose of making changes.

The reality of the purple patch is it makes things too tricky to balance. Pets of all kinds (not just MM pets, but ALL pets for ALL sets and ALL ATs) need to be the owner's level. Back in the day the highest difficulty you could set was +2, but beyond that the system starts to break down. At +0 your minions are a reliable 20% worse than you and that can be baked into the stats. But at +3 the pets are 55% worse than you. And at +4 they're 70% worse than you. There's no linear way to adjust pets so that they have consistent results. Making them the owner's level is step one in making them perform reliably across all content.

We probably won't see those changes until after the holiday though.

 

I really dont want this patch to push through. Why are MMs balanced around the idea that the player is 50+1 tier 4 incarnate with 2 billions influence 53 HAMIs built out?? I love to level MMs because back in the day it it was hard to get teams going, and MMs were basically a mini team. Why are new MM players punished for fighting lower white/blue and green mobs??

 

Im all for the idea behind this patch but the execution is not great. I took my level 50 demons/elec affinity MM and fully tier 4 it out on the beta and the council was beating my pets soo quickly. I have to spam heals and absorbs way more. 

[Bionic_Flea]

I posted some new times for Test pylon and three different dummies (50, 52, 54).  A BIG improvement at +4, about the same on the others.

 

Here for the dummies a little further back for the pylon - 

 

Edited 2 hours ago by GM_GooglyMoogly

[JAMMan0000]

On 11/10/2025 at 4:19 PM, The Curator said:

• Tier 1 and 2 henchmen should be somewhat more survivable as they will be hit less often and for less damage.
• Tier 1 henchmen max HP decreased from 574 to 448
• Tier 2 henchmen max HP decreased from 768 to 654

Last part of first bullet 'will be hit less often and for less damage' may be true. But with HP reductions in 2nd & 3rd bullets, the first part of first bullet 'should be somewhat more survivable' is not true. Net total with these changes T1s & T2s are less survivable.

 

Man I don't want to be a downer. I love all HC and volunteers for what is being done for this game. But, the simple truth is - MMs are their pets. If pets are less survivable its like a triple  multiplicative nerf to the MM. It reduces MM survivability via reduced effectiveness of bodyguard. It reduces MM dps output because dead pets don't dps. It degrades MM general qol play because resummoning pets is just not fun. Push come to shove, I would give up pet dps before sacrificing pet survivability. Maybe the solution is just upping the HPs to some mid-point between old and new values. But, this going live as-is would be a mistake. It will make playing MMs noticeably less fun.

[mechahamham]

47 minutes ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

For one, the way these upgrades are implemented (especially when you zone) is a hard-coded mess (not unlike many other things in the game). Like, the game remembers you summoned your pets but it applies the pet buffs literally by executing these powers on all your henchmen every time you zone, because the pet upgrades are not really saved to the server alongside the bits that tell the server your pets are summoned.

 

There's always a noodle of spaghetti touching something it shouldn't in CoH.

 

Quote

 

There has also been resistance from multiple dev team members that keeping your henchmen alive should be one of the responsibilities of the MM. If they simply get summoned with all the upgrades, the cost of resummoning them becomes too trivial. This is not any one person's opinion, but unless multiple people in the dev team can be sold on a concession/middle ground, it's not likely to change anytime soon.

 

 

For the most part, I feel like this is reasonable. In other games, if pets go down, it's a very big deal and you need to drop everything to get the pet back up ASAP.

 

CoH has a little of that, especially for MMs who spend their time in bodyguard mode. And I agree that 'zerg rush' tactics suck. They're not fun to play. They're not fun to watch. They're 'cheaty' in that they break the *intent* of the game mechanics if not the rules. Especially in the later game, though, mastermind pets just tend to go splatter, though.

 

(That's something that keeps me, personally, from playing non-monster masterminds. The limp bodies of the summons make it feel like I'm failing at something, even if I'm doing okay.)

 

Frequent resummoning is just a thing. If Page 3 makes them more durable against 35+ enemies in general, that's great, and I think the system as it exists here is reasonable and it *shouldn't matter* if there's a nominal recharge or not on the upgrade powers.

 

If Debuff-type Masterminds are still resummoning during or after every fight in 35+ content, that kinda says to me that the durability is still not where it needs to be.

[tidge]

1 hour ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

There has also been resistance from multiple dev team members that keeping your henchmen alive should be one of the responsibilities of the MM. If they simply get summoned with all the upgrades, the cost of resummoning them becomes too trivial. This is not any one person's opinion, but unless multiple people in the dev team can be sold on a concession/middle ground, it's not likely to change anytime soon. Even if a pitch was agreed upon today, it would not be part of this page. I am middle of the road on this stance, personally.

 

I'm not intending to be nasty (especially not to the messenger) but I will state: The first henchmen boost power comes at level 6, and the T2 and T3 summons come at 12 and 22... so it isn't as if most (any?) Masterminds will delay taking the first upgrade until after the T2 (or T3, for T3-only MMs)  is taken. 

 

With the reduction in HP for the T1 and T2... also (still) requiring the first upgrade feels a lot like punching down. I accept the code is a mess, but I feel like the actual buffs from the first upgrade could just be included in the summoning power.

 

[Captain Powerhouse]

4 minutes ago, tidge said:

With the reduction in HP for the T1 and T2... also (still) requiring the first upgrade feels a lot like punching down. I accept the code is a mess, but I feel like the actual buffs from

the first upgrade could just be included in the summoning power.

 

I intend to dive into more detail when I make a full writeup but I do want to clarify:

 

Henchmen HP is untouched at lower levels. 
If you are still at the level where you only summon one T1 pet, that pet is identical to live.
When you summon 2, they will be in the same territory as T2 pets. They will scale into the reduced effectiveness just as before: when you have 3 out at once.

The same holds true for T2s, they will be as strong as they were live until they are dialed back once you start summoning 2.

 

All this applies to damage, tohit, HP levels, and basically all stats.

[Neiska]

Want to know what my biggest takeaway from not just this change, but all the other changes over the years?

 

Don't share things. Don't share builds. Don't share strategies. Keep any super cheesy things to yourself.

 

The moment you discover something that's Good, or you figure out a way to do something that isn't intended, and share it, they will "correct" it, but over-correct and you will find yourself weaker than you were before. Almost like you are being punished for thinking outside the box, not following a blind meta, or being innovative or creative.

 

Some builds I have right now performed better, did better, did more, faster, when I first joined HC 5 years ago, vs now. And with each wave of changes/overhauls, it gets just a wee bit worse. Not by a lot, but it's there. The thing is, I keep my own data going all the way back then. And for me personally, it is definitely a slope in the wrong direction. They call them updates, improvements, etc. But how is it an improvement when it performs worse than before when doing the same activities?

 

Sure, a handful of changes might be an improvement when doing certain activities, like hard modes, or raids etc. But for those of us who do our own thing, 90% of my activities are measurably worse. Some things I used to be able to solo before, now either I can't, or I can but its much more of a struggle. With absolutely no benefit or upside to it at all.

 

Think any super cheesy/loop holes/sneaky strategies/etc that I know of will stay that way. Each time I've shared some of them with people, about 2-3 months later they are suddenly nerfed. Like magic.

[Unknown Magi]

Just going to echo something Sai said.  Instead of releasing "half of the changes" now and the other "half" at some unspecified future date, leaving us in the lurch in the meantime, finish the work and then push it.  While lots of MM players are clamoring for even level pets, I don't think anyone is particularly clamoring for this particular set of changes, and it's creating a negative perception pushing it with promises of future buffs.  Can we just get the whole package all at once, even if that's later?  There's clearly some issues with the changeset as it stands now, and if there's no time to fix it properly, better to hold off than rush it to production.

[Jacke]

6 minutes ago, Unknown Magi said:

Just going to echo something Sai said.  Instead of releasing "half of the changes" now and the other "half" at some unspecified future date, leaving us in the lurch in the meantime, finish the work and then push it.

 

To some degree, on some changes, they have to be done in partial phases.  Despite all the testing Closed and Open, to get things to where the Devs want them has to be tested in the wider arena of a Live Release.  Then they hear a lot more feedback in a lot of situations that is almost impossible to do in testing.

 

As well, to avoid doing absolute nerfs, an initial phase won't go far enough.  So that follow-on phases can be absolute buffs.

 

In the case of same-Level Mastermind Henchmen, I think things could have been more leaned into being a buff and not the mix of whatever they are now.  Which is tilting into being a nerf in far too many cases.

 

 

[WindDemon21]

6 hours ago, Captain Powerhouse said:

 

For one, the way these upgrades are implemented (especially when you zone) is a hard-coded mess (not unlike many other things in the game). Like, the game remembers you summoned your pets but it applies the pet buffs literally by executing these powers on all your henchmen every time you zone, because the pet upgrades are not really saved to the server alongside the bits that tell the server your pets are summoned.

 

There has also been resistance from multiple dev team members that keeping your henchmen alive should be one of the responsibilities of the MM. If they simply get summoned with all the upgrades, the cost of resummoning them becomes too trivial. This is not any one person's opinion, but unless multiple people in the dev team can be sold on a concession/middle ground, it's not likely to change anytime soon. Even if a pitch was agreed upon today, it would not be part of this page. I am middle of the road on this stance, personally.

 

I have personally considered a few potential pitches, like having henchmen gain strength the longer they are "on the payroll" (summoned) or have auto-upgrades apply on a delay, but so far these are just concepts of a plan to discuss internally.

 

Note (not a reply to anyone in particular) I will try to work today on a post trying to clarify many of the impacts of this patch. There is a chance I won't be able to have that post ready until late tomorrow or Friday, though, due to RL stuff and other dev stuff I'm ironing out right now.

Ok, I mean I'm pretty sure one of the other servers has them as autos so it's not that it's not possible, but still, at least make it a pbaoe so you don't have to target your pets to cast it on them PLEASE.

[Unknown Magi]

4 minutes ago, Jacke said:

 

To some degree, on some changes, they have to be done in partial phases.  Despite all the testing Closed and Open, to get things to where the Devs want them has to be tested in the wider arena of a Live Release.  Then they hear a lot more feedback in a lot of situations that is almost impossible to do in testing.

 

As well, to avoid doing absolute nerfs, an initial phase won't go far enough.  So that follow-on phases can be absolute buffs.

 

In the case of same-Level Mastermind Henchmen, I think things could have been more leaned into being a buff and not the mix of whatever they are now.  Which is tilting into being a nerf in far too many cases.

 

 

 

It's not that this "isn't going far enough", it's that this feels like an unwanted trade.  There's some improvement in some categories in some cases.  But at least as many drawbacks in the same and other categories.  Overall, this feels like a nerf, even if not absolute.  And I don't really buy "we have to nerf it first so we can buff it later" based on the history of how other ATs have been handled (buff first, fix later).  

[ivanhedgehog]

11 hours ago, BasiliskXVIII said:

I mean, please don't take this as a clap back to your points, because I think we're in agreement. I just think it needs to be reinforced with as many voices as possible that setting the expectation of optimal performance at +2 is deeply unfair to people who are more interested in the 1-50 side of the game than the 50+ part of the game. Particularly since on some of the smaller servers it's very difficult to get enough interest to actually fire the large team content.

 

This feels very much like the dev team is getting away from the philosophy of "the game is not balanced around IO builds" if, in order to maintain parity with the current state, you're expected to have a bunch of +MaxHP bonuses to share. I don't know if my experience with the game is different than most, but I don't typically invest into basic IOs until level 35, and IO sets until I'm able to slot the max level for the sets. So even if it is better for a level 50 running at +4/x8, it feels like the expectation becomes "Please don't play the game. Powerlevel your MMs to 50 in a fire farm and get yourself kitted out there, and then you can be useful." Because the 1-50 gameplay is already kind of a slog on MMs, and they want to make this worse. 

 

Devs, put this change back in the oven; it ain't done baking yet.

This exactly. I am testing with so's only. If I have to slot IO(or worse sets) then it is a fail. I tend to have fun leveling toons to 50 and switching to a different AT/set

[BRADICAL]

Something important to remember is that this patch also includes the possibility of +5 spawns showing up in +4 difficulty content, which is a big reason why the initial set of MM changes had to go through to prevent the AT from becoming actually sidelined by the game more than it already was in some areas. And because it's such a big project, iteration from the ground up makes sense to get as much data as possible, so there is logic to the way this is being handled at least.

 

The actual implementation when looking at things on a broader level, unnecessary nerfs and inconsistent design philosophy in the powers are where I disagree, but those are all part of the iterative process too, more or less.

[Troo]

14 hours ago, ScarySai said:

In their current state, these changes are an embarrassing joke. A nerf to one of the weakest archetypes in practice.

 

Numerically the changes are better.

With the exception of a couple typos, they are better (unless folks can prove with examples otherwise). Play style may need to adjust in order to fully benefit.

Accept this and a little lube will make the changes easier to take.

[Maelwys]

2 hours ago, WindDemon21 said:

Ok, I mean I'm pretty sure one of the other servers has them as autos so it's not that it's not possible, but still, at least make it a pbaoe so you don't have to target your pets to cast it on them PLEASE.

 

I'd be happier if it was possible to just trigger the upgrades on a henchmen that was not on the ground. 

 

Whenever I have to resummon one pet on a MM that has Group Fly running... they have to fly down far enough to target a patch of ground to summon that pet, then also direct a second pet to fly to the ground in order to trigger both upgrades on that second pet (so that the resummoned pet ends up having the upgrades by the time it finishes spawning and becomes targetable)... 🍝 😵‍💫

 

Edited 8 hours ago by Maelwys

[blue4333]

does anyone know how much of a DPS increase of having even-level pets without all the Acc and proc rate nerfs would be? i doubt it will be more than dominators let alone scrappers/blasters

[MoonSheep]

On 11/11/2025 at 12:24 AM, Maelwys said:

(i) Hurrah! 😁
 

Thank you, sincerely, for the work you've put into this.
 

 

---

 

(ii) For everyone seeing this for the first time... be aware that the "set bonus inheritance" only applies to actual "IO Set" Set Bonuses.

This means +MaxHP Set Bonuses from things like 3x Miracle and 3x Numina (+1.88% Hitpoints) work just fine... however effects from something like the Unbreakable Guard +7.5% MaxHP IO (which FUNCTIONS as a "Set Bonus" but isn't one of the Set Bonuses listed at the bottom of the IO Set whenever you hover over it) won't work.
 

In the same vein... "KB Protection" will inherit from 3x Gladiator's Armor IOs but won't from a Steadfast Protection, a Karma or a Blessing of the Zephyr IO etc.
 

(And yes, henchmen getting reliable knockback protection is one of the biggest winners from this patch, even if it's just -1.2mag per 3x Gladiators Armor!!)

 

 

---

 

(iii) I would like to point out that "henchmen becoming even-level" isn't quite the buff that it might first seem.

Traditionally the #1 complaint of MM players is that their T1 and T2 pets find it difficult to hit a foe which is higher than +3 to the MM (e.g. +5 to the T1 and +4 to the T2).
THIS PATCH DOES NOTHING TO HELP WITH T1 AND T2 HENCHMEN HIT CHANCE beyond them gaining access to 40% of the MM's own Global Accuracy set bonuses (NOT Kismet!) because Mastermind T1 and T2 Henchmen currently have their Hit Rate artificially lowered by -8% (T2s) and  -17% (T1s).

T1:

T2:

T3:


This replicates their Hit Rate penalty on Live (where they're lower level) but it means getting them able to reliably hit higher level mobs is still a royal PITA. 
Anyways, as IMO this is the biggest headache facing MMs and the changes do not go far enough in addressing it; I'm going to restate my proposed solution(s) below:

...
...
...

T1 and T2 HENCHMEN HIT RATE:

Problem: Mastermind T1 and T2 Henchmen currently have their Hit Rate lowered by -8% (T2s) and  -17% (T1s).
Even with the +10% ToHit from Supremacy, T1 henchmen still require just under 200% Accuracy (more than twice the ED cap!) before they'll achieve 95% Hit Rate versus the new Level 55 mobs; before debuffs. Which is completely unfeasible. Taking Tactics can somewhat offset this; as can taking specific primaries (Ninjas can slot Kismet into their T1 upgrade; Thugs have Enforcer Tactics) however it's still extremely difficult to reach the required levels of accuracy slotting. (e.g. even with Supremacy and fully-slotted Tactics your T1 pets still still require ~26% above ED-Capped Accuracy!)

Ideal Solution: Lose the Hit Rate debuffs completely; give the T1 and T2 pets the default (75%) Base Hit Rate.

Potential Compromise Solution: Swap the Hit Rate debuffs out for Accuracy debuffs.
This would mean that the T1 and T2 henchmen still have a significant penalty; but it's far more achievable to counteract that penalty against higher level foes via additional Accuracy slotting. Having "Base Accuracy" differences between different critter "Ranks" is also a well-established thing - see the "Rank-Based Accuracy Multipliers" table here.

As an example... if there was a -15% accuracy debuff on the T2s and -30% accuracy debuff on the T1s?

With Supremacy:
vs a +4 foe:  the T2s would require ~109% Accuracy (rather than ~142%) and the T1s would require ~124% Accuracy (rather than ~197%)
vs a +3 foe:  the T2s would require ~79% Accuracy (rather than ~90%) and the T1s would require ~94% Accuracy (rather than ~132%)

vs a +2 foe:  the T2s would require ~59% Accuracy (rather than ~64%) and the T1s would require ~74% Accuracy (rather than ~94%)

vs a +1 foe:  the T2s would require ~42% Accuracy (rather than ~42%) and the T1s would require ~57% Accuracy (rather than ~64%)

vs a +0 foe:  the T2s would require ~27% Accuracy (rather than ~24%) and the T1s would require ~42% Accuracy (rather than ~40%)

With Supremacy and ED-Capped ("+12% ToHit") Tactics:
vs a +4 foe:  the T2s would require ~71% Accuracy (rather than ~80%) and the T1s would require ~86% Accuracy (rather than ~116%)
vs a +3 foe:  the T2s would require ~51% Accuracy (rather than ~54%) and the T1s would require ~66% Accuracy (rather than ~80%)

vs a +2 foe:  the T2s would require ~37% Accuracy (rather than ~36%) and the T1s would require ~52% Accuracy (rather than ~56%)

vs a +1 foe:  the T2s would require ~25% Accuracy (rather than ~21%) and the T1s would require ~40% Accuracy (rather than ~36%)

vs a +0 foe:  the T2s would require ~13% Accuracy (rather than ~7%) and the T1s would require ~28% Accuracy (rather than ~19%)

So that works out better vs +1s and above (with no Tactics) and vs +2s and above (with fully-slotted Tactics). And the negative impact against low-level foes is very minor.
Also; personally I think taking Tactics and getting 86% Accuracy aspect in my T1 henchmen is an appropriate level of investment to reliably hit +4 mobs before debuffs.

Look at the far right column in the below spreadsheet snippet.
That's the Accuracy aspect slotting required for each of the Henchmen tiers to get them to cap their Hit Rate vs +3 or +4 mobs.
And yes, that's +197% Accuracy required in your T1s (e.g. the equivalent of "6x Accuracy SOs" before ED kicks in!) if you're not taking Tactics.
Even with a 6-slotted Tactics they still need ED-capped Accuracy plus another ~20% from set bonuses (which currently means their Master having +50% Global Accuracy)



 

---

Also...

MASTERMIND ATO SLOTTING:

Problem: Mastermind ATOs can only currently be slotted into the Pet summon abilities and specific Tier 7 abilities.
On Live, specific Mastermind Primary powersets have more opportunity than the rest to slot ATOs - Thugs and Demons and Necromancy have Tier 7 powers (Gang War/Hell on Earth/Soul Extraction) which can take the ATOs. But Beasts, Mercs, Ninjas and Robotics do not.
On Test there has been an attempt to resolve this by giving the Tier 7 powers of those latter four powersets (Fortify Pack, Serum, Smoke Flash and Maintenance Drone) the ability to slot ATOs. However none of those abilities benefit from Damage aspect slotting; and many of them do not benefit from Accuracy aspect slotting. Therefore much of the benefit of these ATOs is getting wasted (and Serum has some other potential issues with how +Damage enhancement interacts with +DamageResistance enhancement under the hood!)

Ideal Solution: Let all damaging Mastermind Primary Attacks have the ability to slot ATOs.
This would mean Personal Attacks from Mastermind Primary Powersets such as Call Swarm, Burst, Snap Shot and Pulse Rifle Blast would become able to take and benefit from the ATO sets and all of their various enhancement aspects - accuracy, damage, endurance and recharge. Having 3 extra powers per set which can potentially take ATOs would also open up a lot of build variety for Masterminds and drastically ease the pressure on sets like Mercs (which simply cannot cram every beneficial IO into its three summon abilities!)

Potential Compromise Solution: Let the T1 and/or T2 Mastermind Primary Personal Attacks have the ability to slot ATOs.
Similar to the above, but it'd limit the scope of MM ATO slotting to only one or two personal attacks; in case the Devs are concerned about opening it up too wide.

 

---

And also...

T1 AND T2 HENCHMEN DAMAGE OUTPUT:

Problem: Due to them becoming "even-level", Mastermind T1 and T2 Henchmen will deal more raw damage than before vs regular enemies.

On Live, T1 Henchmen deal 80% damage versus a mob that is "even level" to their Master. T2 Henchmen deal 90% damage. And it gets worse as enemy level rises.
Because this uses the purple patch scaling it affects ALL DAMAGE; including procs.
On Test, they're now technically dealing 100% damage against an "even level" mob. But their regular damage modifiers and proc damage modifiers have been tweaked. These tweaks (particularly proc damage) changed from patch to patch on Closed Beta so have been difficult to pin down... but the stated intent is that regular damage should be "lower vs even level and +1, about the same against +2 and much better vs anything +3 and higher" and proc damage should be "about as effective as before vs +3 foes."


Ideal Solution: It'd be easy to say "just set T1/T2 henchmen base damage to 80%/90% of what it is on Live; including procs"... but due to how things scale as enemy level rises that would work out drastically better versus higher level foes.

Example damage ramp up versus higher-level foes with T1/T2 base damage of 80%/90% compared to Live
vs +0s: 100% damage (T1s) and 100% damage (T2s)
vs +1s: 111% damage (T1s) and 101% damage (T2s)
vs +2s: 133% damage (T1s) and 111% damage (T2s)
vs +3s: 173% damage (T1s) and 122% damage (T2s)
vs +4s: 256% damage (T1s) and 144% damage (T2s)

However to put this into perspective; there's a (rather persuasive to my mind) argument that the contribution to MM damage from T1 henchmen is relatively minor. Whilst dealing 73% more raw damage versus +3 foes looks like a pretty hefty jump; in practice that's only really going from 0.3 base damage to 0.52 base damage (e.g. a Battle Drone's "Heavy Laser Burst" would rise from 15.05 --> 26.08 damage per hit) and an increase in the order of ~11 damage per hit probably isn't worth worrying about in the grand scheme of things. Therefore if we pick +0 foes as the "break even" point and simply allow it to ramp up versus higher level foes then the sky is unlikely to fall in.

Potential Compromise Solution: My gut feeling is that regular T1/T2 attack damage output having a "break even" point against +2 foes is acceptable... but proc damage could still use a bit of work. As far as I'm aware the most recent Dev power pokings made it so that compared to Live, henchmen damage from Incarnate Procs (e.g. "Damage over Time" from various Interface slot abilities; and "Double Hits" from the Hybrid slot Assault Radial abilities) is now severely reduced (at least outside of "Incarnate Content") but their damage from Regular Set IO procs is less severely reduced. And IMO this is one thing that could really do with further testing by a wider audience on Open Beta.

To illustrate this; consider what happens whenever my henchmen fight a level 51 (e.g. even-level, not levelless!) Pylon in the RWZ


On Live, T1s/T2s/T3s:




On Test, T1s/T2s/T3s:




Notice in particular the "Doublehit" and "Reactive Interface" proc damage. Even on my T3 henchmen (which has NOT had its level adjusted!) it's 65% lower on Test.

 

---

And I'll close on a positive note...

T1 AND T2 HENCHMEN SURVIVABILITY:

Rebalancing the now-even-level T1/T2 henchmen's "survivability" was a particularly problematic issue on Closed Beta.
Without mentioning any specifics, suffice to say that lowering the HP of the T1 and T2 pets was by far the best solution; and IMO the devs got this balance just right.

But it's worth pointing out that what the Devs call T1/T2 henchmen's "Max HP" in the patch notes is what players would generally refer to as their "Base HP".

Whilst a HP decrease of 22% [T1s] and 16% [T2s] might seem a bit harsh; given that at most they're only taking ~18% [T1] and ~10% [T2] less damage compared to Live; they're now getting the benefit of +MaxHP set bonuses (which are based on the MASTER'S HP not the Henchmen's!) so it's not quite as harmful in practice.
 
(With set bonuses my Bot/Kin's T1s are sitting on 480.99 HP and their T2s on 678.34 HP, which is effectively a reduction of -16.20% [T1s] and -11.67% [T2s] compared to Live)


There is ALSO a corresponding reduction of 22.00% (T1) and 16.00% (T2) in what players would generally refer to as their T1/T2 henchmen's "Maximum HP limit".

LIVE:



TEST:



However in practice this will likely only affect Cold Domination (Frostwork!) and Marine (Power of the Depths) MMs.

 

 

so.. as an outsider opinion maelwys

 

it looks like a considerable amount of time has been spent to debuff the buff gained from changing the pet levels?

 

and now a considerable amount of time is needed to understand the impact, which is probably a net 0% gain or net nerf for the average player that doesn’t spend their life playing on +4/x8

[MoonSheep]

as a thought, perhaps these changes are intended to keep masterminds competitive in the new expanded level range but not give them a noticeable buff for regular content?

 

could explain the (perceived) unnecessary level of complexity

[Chrome]

31 minutes ago, MoonSheep said:

as a thought, perhaps these changes are intended to keep masterminds competitive in the new expanded level range but not give them a noticeable buff for regular content?

 

could explain the (perceived) unnecessary level of complexity

and my response to this would be why wouldn't you want to buff them for regular content?  IMO and those of my small circle of friends is that MMs are just plain worse at everything with more hassle.  IF you can keep your pets close and alive and on defensive and IF the MM takes damage and your pets DECIDE to all  attack the same target one at a time then MMs feel pretty good, but as soon as you take them out of defensive or the pets start attacking all separate targets or the MM doesnt take any damage (while they are in defensive ) you are effectively useless.  this doesnt even begin to touch the level differences and main part of this focused feed back.  if for a few months or pages or what have you MMs became the Meta why would that be bad.  I think that there is some idea somewhere that MMs are on an even playing field with other ATs, and this is just wrong objectively.  If simply making MM Pets even level with the MM will put them slightly higher damage than a Dominator, so be it!  let them have a chance to shine after having such a very long time in the doghouse. 

 

This is very confusing, it feels like they are trying to keep the MM at the bottom instead of taking this opportunity to  bring them up to snuff while at the same time also adjusting them for the newer content they are making.

 

I say let MMs be "plant control" for a bit and let them have a chance to be needed/wanted in groups. then slowly tune it down over time if needed.  

 

 

[Maelwys]

3 hours ago, blue4333 said:

does anyone know how much of a DPS increase of having even-level pets without all the Acc and proc rate nerfs would be? i doubt it will be more than dominators let alone scrappers/blasters

It varies wildly depending on what you're fighting, and that's kinda the problem.

Because of the Purple Patch scaling; the damage does not drop off linearly, but exponentially as you start fighting foes that are vastly higher level than you.
https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Purple_Patch - note the uneven progression there whenever you are BELOW the target.
Whenever you're fighting "higher level" targets you don't just lose 10% damage per level difference; instead it goes 100%->90%->80%->65%->48%->30%->15%->8% etc.

This severe dropoff in damage matters the most for balancing whenever you're up against +3s or over... at that point the damage inflicted by a MM's T1 Henchmen will be less than half of the damage inflicted by their T3 Henchmen, even if their attacks are completely identical (x0.3 damage modifier compared to x0.65).

- - - - - - - - - -

As a very straightforward example...

...let's say all your pets just each have a single attack (Heavy Brawl!) that does 100 damage.
How different would the damage output be if you just made the T1 and T2 pets even-level?

(i) If you're fighting an even-level foe... currently the T1s would each inflict 0.8*100=80 damage; and the T2s 0.9*100=90 damage; and the T3 100 damage.
For 3x80+2x90+1x100=520 damage total... whereas if your pets were even-level they'd all inflict 100; for 6x100=600 total.
600/520=1.153846; so making pets even-level in that case would it'd result in 15.4% additional damage.

(ii) If you're fighting a +1 foe... currently the T1s would each inflict 0.65*100=65 damage; and the T2s 0.8*100=80 damage; and the T3 0.9*100=90 damage.

For 3x65+2x80+1x90=445 damage total... whereas if your pets were even-level they'd all inflict 90; for 6x90=540 total.
540/445=1.213483; so making pets even-level in that case would it'd result in 21.3% additional damage.

...fighting +2s; it'd be 3x48+2x65+1x80=354 damage versus 6*80=480; 480/354=1.35593 for 35.6% additional damage.
...fighting +3s; it'd be 3x30+2x48+1x65=251 damage versus 6*65=390; 390/251=1.55378 for 55.4% additional damage.
...fighting +4s; it'd be 3x15+2x30+1x48=153 damage versus 6*48=288; 288/153=1.88235 for 88.2% additional damage.
...fighting +5s; it'd be 3x8+2x15+1x30=84 damage versus 6*30=180; 180/84=2.14286 for 114.3% additional damage.

So you really have to pick a single point to balance around.


The difficulty scale in CoH allows you to choose to fight -1s through to +4s (now +5s!)
That's seven possible "mob levels": [-1], [+0], [+1], [+2], [+3], [+4], [+5] so balancing around [+2] is slap bang in the middle.

On a regular mid-to-late-game team, it's rare that you're fighting anything less than +1s/+2s. 
Most higher tier players when soloing will also be setting their difficulty sliders higher (+3/+4) which will result in them fighting +2s and above.
At level 50 with the T3 Alpha +1 level shift... you'll end up fighting at most +4s (the new level 55 mobs) outside of Incarnate content.

Sure; many toons will start out fighting even-level foes. But that tends to be a short-term thing; and even looooooooong before IOs were available; all the ATs were capable of aiming higher. Even "pre-IO, pre-sustain, old defiance" Blasters of mine were fighting +1s by level 32. All of my Masterminds (I had several, but my favourites were Bot/Traps, Bots/Dark and Demons/FF) were fighting +2 or higher by the time they were able to slot SOs. There are certainly some powerset combinations which struggle more (see /Poison MMs) but by and large MMs were always one of the easiest ATs to solo with. So whilst they might be dealing a little less damage^[1] versus +0s and +1s now; the fact that they're dealing more damage versus +3s, +4s and +5s is most welcome IMO.

[1] And it is only a little less in practice; because the T1 henchmen are the worst affected (inflicting at most ~25% lower damage than before vs +0s) however they typically contribute much less damage than your other pets anyway. As you can see from the pylon times already posted; the difference in overall damage output is almost negligible.

(and please don't get me wrong here - I'd also PREFER it if the break-even point was set lower than +2s; but I can at least UNDERSTAND why they've done it this way!) 🙂

- - - - - - - - - -

I'm more concerned with Henchmen survivability.

The -HP debuffs on the T1 and T2 henchmen are almost exactly cancelling out the fact they're taking less damage and being hit less often as a result of becoming even-level.
So if MMs were only ever fighting regular foes and taking damage that way, then there'd be no problem.
However; that's not the entire picture.

@tidge noted earlier in this thread that some of the GMs they were fighting on Test took about the same amount of time as they did on Live... but others took much longer; mainly because their pets died more often (more resummonings required).
Whilst the fact that some of these GM fights took the same time to defeat is good news (alongside the pylon testing it helps prove that pet damage output hasn't been lowered too much), the fact that pets were dying more often here is a bit concerning... even if it's not exactly unexpected. GMs are effectively "levelless" - they treat everything that they're fighting as even-level. This means that on both Live and Test, a GM should be hitting all of your henchmen for exactly the same amount of damage; however T1/T2 henchmen on Test have lower HP so it will take less damage to kill them.

"Levelless" GM encounters should be the only time this happens (a non-levelless foe on Live would have had its damage multiplied by 1.22 against T1 henchmen and by 1.11 against T2 henchmen - which is offset by the HP differences!) but they're quite tough fights and a favourite pastime of many players.

And then there's Bodyguard mode. A lot of soloing MMs place themselves in Bodyguard mode for survivability... however if the share of bodyguard damage absorbed by T1/T2 pets remains the same as before but those pets have lower HP pools (on Test) then the MM's survivability becomes lower.

Which is why I think THIS ROUND OF CHANGES IS PROBABLY OK; if it's purely to establish a new performance baseline... but why I also think that SURVIVABILITY BUFFS ARE NEEDED IN THE NEAR FUTURE (ideally raising henchmen base HP across the board) alongside Hit Rate buffs to T1/T2 pets; and ideally also a higher potential damage ceiling for henchmen (so that MM become more attractive damage-dealers to teams and can draw a little closer to the 500%-damage-cap ATs).

There are certainly other things on my MM wishlist - ATOs being slottable into their personal attacks; higher base damage scalars on all the pets (I still think their damage output is a little low in general unless you have a secondary powerset that can stack noteworthy -res debuffs or +damage buffs); Inspiration inheritance (so single-target inspirations consumed by the MM at least partially affect the henchmen), various other AI tweaks and QOL changes (like mid-air upgrades/summonings) etc. etc... but those are all "wants" rather than "needs".

The biggest QOL change would probably be finding a way for all pets (but MM henchmen in particular) to reliably keep up with fast-paced teams ...however as mentioned previously, I know the Devs are keenly aware of that issue, so it's likely to be a question of how and when rather than if.

/essay
 

Edited 4 hours ago by Maelwys

[MoonSheep]

1 hour ago, Chrome said:

and my response to this would be why wouldn't you want to buff them for regular content?  IMO and those of my small circle of friends is that MMs are just plain worse at everything with more hassle.  IF you can keep your pets close and alive and on defensive and IF the MM takes damage and your pets DECIDE to all  attack the same target one at a time then MMs feel pretty good, but as soon as you take them out of defensive or the pets start attacking all separate targets or the MM doesnt take any damage (while they are in defensive ) you are effectively useless.  this doesnt even begin to touch the level differences and main part of this focused feed back.  if for a few months or pages or what have you MMs became the Meta why would that be bad.  I think that there is some idea somewhere that MMs are on an even playing field with other ATs, and this is just wrong objectively.  If simply making MM Pets even level with the MM will put them slightly higher damage than a Dominator, so be it!  let them have a chance to shine after having such a very long time in the doghouse. 

 

This is very confusing, it feels like they are trying to keep the MM at the bottom instead of taking this opportunity to  bring them up to snuff while at the same time also adjusting them for the newer content they are making.

 

I say let MMs be "plant control" for a bit and let them have a chance to be needed/wanted in groups. then slowly tune it down over time if needed.  

 

 

 

i am wholly aligned to your view of MMs

 

i want to like them and have wanted to play one for so many years but it feels like in order for them to be comparable to other ATs you need to invest heavily in a Rube Goldberg of complex builds and advanced play strategy just to be on par for a niche selection of use cases where they operate in an acceptable but not mindblowing level of performance

 

at present they’re not worth the hassle for the limited situations where they can contribute. having an MM on the team is essentially a filler position

[Maelwys]

59 minutes ago, MoonSheep said:

have wanted to play one for so many years but it feels like in order for them to be comparable to other ATs you need to invest heavily in a Rube Goldberg of complex builds and advanced play strategy just to be on par for a niche selection of use cases where they operate in an acceptable but not mindblowing level of performance

FWIW, there are specific MM combos that are very, VERY good.

Robotics/Kinetics.

Various /Time and /Dark and /Cold.

Anything /Marine.

The bulk of a MM's primary powerset damage is effectively "passive" (whilst you need to issue orders in order to keep the henchmen on-target and alive; dealing damage with them doesn't require you to spend ANY animation time) which means that you can concentrate almost all of your active button pressing animation-time-consuming efforts on your Secondary powerset. So powersets that require a lot of clicking to play optimally (like Dark and Marine and Kinetics) benefit.

You also don't really need to bother much with careful positioning of your own character -  you just need to stay within 60ft of your henchmen (Supremacy Range)... which means powersets that require careful positioning (like Dark and Marine and Kinetics) benefit.

Certain primaries (like Bots and Demons) also provide the player with rather nice survivability buffs (Protector Bot +Def Bubbles, and Ember Demon's +Res Shield). In combination with Bodyguard mode, any Secondary powersets that are traditionally rather frail (like Cold and Kinetics) benefit.

A lot of secondary powersets also have fast-recharging, long-duration allied defensive buffs (like Kinetics) or allied offensive buffs (like Kinetics) or allied heals (like Kinetics) and a few of them don't particularly care about MM's lower base buff/debuff scalars (like Kinetics) or benefit more from some of the rider effects on MM Primary powerset attacks such as Demons' -Res or Robotics' -Regen (like Kinetics).

Playing MMs efficiently may well require a lot of micromanagement, practice and build tweaking, and up until now offensively they've definitely been much less effective than other ATs against +3/+4/+5 foes (and it's often difficult for non-speed-boosted henchmen to reliably "keep pace"!). However there are definitely a few standout powerset combinations/builds out there... did I mention Robotics/Kinetics yet?

  

9 hours ago, Neiska said:

Don't share things. Don't share builds. Don't share strategies. Keep any super cheesy things to yourself.

 

The moment you discover something that's Good, or you figure out a way to do something that isn't intended, and share it, they will "correct" it, but over-correct and you will find yourself weaker than you were before. Almost like you are being punished for thinking outside the box, not following a blind meta, or being innovative or creative.

 

...actually, Forget all that. All MMs are total rubbish. Especially Robotics/Kinetics. More buffs please! 

More seriously, whilst I'm indeed rather fond of my own Bots/Kin; most MM players seem to find /Kinetics a royal PITA on Primaries with non-melee-AI Pets because it takes a lot of effort and practice to constantly issue all the GOTO commands to reliably get the pets into position for Fulcrum Shift/Transfusion/etc. All that micromanagement definitely isn't for everyone; and IMO it balances out because the more "cruise control" MM powerset combinations simply don't have as high a potential performance ceiling.

And they've been nerfed already anyway.

I imagine part of the reason Neiska is so salty here is that Robotics used to be EXTREMELY good at AoE damage; then the rework in i27p5 resulted in a moderate damage gain for their Single Target damage plus an incredibly severe reduction to their AoE damage ceiling. I really miss killing mapfuls of mobs with multiple overlapping Incendiary Swarm Missiles; even if I can objectively-speaking recognise that all of that runaway damage stacking was definitely overpowered and unintentional. Other pet sets like Necro have gotten straight buffs. The result is that Beasts is the only standout underperforming Primary on Live at present; so that's probably a good thing, nostalgia notwithstanding... 🤷‍♂️
 

Edited 3 hours ago by Maelwys

[Riverdusk]

Can I also ask how the 40% of set bonuses carrying over was decided on?  Like really? Would it really break the game to make it an easy even 50% so that I don't have to break out my calculator to figure it out?  Thanks.