What's your plan when Page 3 goes Live?

[Neiska]

15 minutes ago, tidge said:

 

Since this is the MM forum:...I don't think Robotics got nerfed when it was changed, minimally:

• Maintenance Drone is a godsend.
• Knockback was all but eliminated from henchmen attacks.

Those two changes radically upped performance. One slot (KB->KD) was freed from each tier; Robots became less of a micro-management issue with the healing drone. Also at this time, the levels we could get the higher-tier powers was lowered. Who Will Die #1 went from 15 minutes on a MM to under 7 (like every other AT).

 

I don't think the henchmen losing -regen or the change to Swarm Missiles was that big a deal. The biggest change I noticed was that I could no longer go AFK on a Giant Monster and find that the henches had defeated them without me pressing a single button. I already had 2 Rifle attacks in my build, and I'd "solved" all endurance issues (for the MM, for the Henchmen) so it isn't like I had to change my build or playstyle (except for that 'going AFK' option was off the table. My play in content with fewer henchmen improved. 

 

The T3 missile burn patches were reduced in targets substantially, from 12 to 3 IIRC. The damage wasn't the initial hit, it was the fire puddle after that. The Drone is nice for secondaries that didn't have a heal, and the KB removal was nice. But the loss of the AOE was a bit impact, especially since Robots was the one primary that had good AoE in the first place. Now none of them really have good AoE. They have some but none of them excel at it. And personally, I dislike being forced/bribed/encouraged to take personal attacks especially since none of them do good damage to begin with, with an END penalty on top of that. So, in order to make personal attacks worth considering they added secondary effects, which is kind of lame in my opinion. Doubly so in robots case, due to us originally already having -regen in our toolkit in the first place. Other primaries got something new, we kept what we already had, but now it takes us more power slots to get it. And to this day I don't feel the "increased ST damage" a fair trade. Not even close. 

 

And far as my builds, my clear time with the map I test with went from 3 minutes to clear, all the way to 9 minutes. Same build, same enhancements, same everything. My demons actually clear the same map faster now, at 7 minutes. On top of that, things I used to solo such as GMs, are either no longer possible, or it takes so long or it's so cumbersome to do that it just isn't fun to do anymore.

 

So, in a nutshell - if you take the personal attacks, then you might see some benefit. But if you don't and want to use those slots on other things, then you will do worse. I wouldn't call that a "win."

 

And it's fine if we disagree. I consider the robot change old news by now, it was 2 years ago. But I did far better, did more activities, and did them faster with the old one than the new one. Make of that what you will.

[Maelwys]

 

  

19 hours ago, Neiska said:

I am skeptical at best that "major buffs beyond these are coming." Case in point - you consider this patch a buff. I consider it a lateral nerf. We never receive "buffs." We get "shuffles" or "trade-offs." I don't consider giving up 18% damage for 15% durability an even trade on this particular AT.

 

For builds that build accordingly for things like pet durability, lets say, robots/time, they are already got strong defenses, so have minimal gain. But give up 18% damage for essentially nothing?

...

In closing I do not believe this is a buff. It's at best, a trade. And a trade that focuses on some secondaries but is essentially a kick in the wedding tackle to others. And for me personally, "But it's better doing this harder difficulty" is not a selling point. And this is coming from someone who PREFERS harder difficulties like +4/8.

 

Let me start off by saying that I've already stated; loudly; that I'd have preferred the devs put the "break even" point for MM damage output at +0 instead of at +2.

I completely get that it feels frustrating to be nerfed. 

However the reality of the purple patch is that there is a drastic damage decrease fighting anything over +2 - the damage dealt drops from 100% (+0s) -> 90% (+1s) -> 80% (+2s) -> 65% (+3s) -> 48% (+4s) -> 30% (+5s) -> 15% (+6s) -> 08% (+7s). And ON LIVE Mastermind T1 Henchmen spawn at -2 to you; which means if you're fighting +4s (let alone +5s!) those T1s will only inflict 15% of their raw damage; but your T3s would be inflicting 48% of their raw damage - making the T3s more than 3 times better off.

This is part of why masterminds suck vs higher-conning foes (the other parts being that the T1 pets also have a severely handicapped Hit Rate and tend to get one-shot).

Therefore if the Devs want to increase mob difficulty options across the playerbase (and they do!) then mastermind pets need to stop spawning lower-level.

That's the scenario we find ourselves in here, in a nutshell.

- - - - - - - - - -

However the devs want to tread exceptionally carefully.

The last time the devs made major adjustments to an AT was Tankers; and that did not go down very well. In i26p4 Tankers were buffed a lot; then in i28p2 those buffs were toned down a little bit. Currently Tankers are still far stronger than they were before i26p4 (see here); but because people had time to get used to the "too high" performance they screamed absolute bloody murder whenever the inevitable nerfs landed.

So the devs are VERY, VERY hesitant here - they really do not want to set the initial performance of Even-Level Henchmen (particularly damage output!) too high and then have to nerf it again later. Apparently the current plan is to first simply make pets even-level (this patch!) and give that a chance to get tested and "bed in"... then afterwards they can make further adjustments to tweak MM performance gradually (upwards!) until it hits a level that they're happy with.

We're not allowed to reveal the specifics of what's happening on Closed Beta. But CPH has already stated openly that there is a VERY BIG set of changes due next patch (after the holidays!). The MM changes currently in Open Beta were intentionally separated from that big patch in order to give everyone a decent opportunity to test them.

- - - - - - - - - -
 

OK. So the goal is to "make mastermind pets even-level" whilst altering current performance as little as possible.

...How?

Well... it turns out that hit rate is rather easy; as it's the same difference regardless of what you're fighting. So all you need is flat tohit debuffs to the T1 and T2 pets. Done.

But keeping Survivability and Damage Output the same as before is much harder.
 

The differences in damage taken are at least linear - T1s going from a +6 foe hitting them to a +4 hitting them (13.25% less damage) is only a little different than going from a +2 foe hitting them to a +0 hitting them (18.03% less damage). So the Devs tried a few things here - and the one that made it to Open Beta was -MaxHP (which didn't overly negatively impact specific powersets; and was actually pretty balanced, until you remember that henchmen also take damage via bodyguard mode!). Ultimately, they reverted it; presumably because the Devs became comfortable that giving T1/T2 henchmen ~18%/10% higher survivability than before wasn't going to make the sky fall in.
 

The differences in damage output however are definitely not linear: because of the purple patch.
If they just left things as-is... the T1s would be dealing +33.93% damage vs +0s, +35.42% vs +1s, +43.59% vs +2s, +60% vs +3s, +160% vs +4s and +275% vs +5s.
So they need to "rebalance" the damage dealt; so that the pets break-even somewhere.
And they decided to set the break-even point at vs +2s.

(Shamelessly stealing CPH's table here...)

Test Delta [Base Damage]
	T1	T2	T3
+0	-25%	-10%	0%
+1	-17%	-9%	0%
+2	0%	0%	0%
+3	+30%	+10%	0%
+4	+92%	+30%	0%
+5	+125%	+62%	0%

And yes, that looks a bit rough for Masterminds who fight even-level foes.
However it's a slight increase in damage vs +3 mobs, and a HUGE comparative increase vs +4 mobs, let alone +5s.

And where, traditionally, do MMs tend to actually struggle? Yup... whenever you're fighting +4 mobs or higher.


There are also two reasons that I'm not particularly butthurt over this nerf to damage output vs +0 foes.

(i) Firstly; the T1 henchmen tend to contribute proportionally less of the MM's overall damage, so a -25% damage decrease for them in practice isn't nearly as bad as you might think (we've actually people in the Focussed Feedback thread who are posting practically identical cleartimes!).
(ii) Secondly; the differences in damage taken mean that T1/T2 henchmen are getting more of a survivability boost against +0 foes (18.03% less damage taken) than against +5 foes. (12.43% less damage taken). Which means that anyone who is choosing to fight +0 foes because they struggle at higher difficulty levels (e.g. non-optimized characters!) will at least be getting a hefty survivability boost to offset the lower damage dealt.

I do however appreciate that it's a particular PITA vs "levelless" foes like GMs; since you're effectively taking an extra DPS loss of -20% (T1s) and -10% (T2s).

  

19 hours ago, Neiska said:

About the "but pets get 40% bonus" is really moot
...
aside from niche things like the Knockback protection, which is nice for sets that don't have any, the rest really is "meh" at best. 

 

I view the Set Bonus inheritance as an extra; rather than as something the Devs are implementing in order to offset the even-level changes. 
Set Bonuses having some kind of effect on henchmen has been a Quality-Of-Life request for MMs for some time.

KB Protection is definitely the main draw for me now; although +MaxHP is noticeably further beefing up the survivability of my T1s (as it's based on the Master's HP pool).

Also... the fact that Recharge Set Bonuses (and Recharge enhancement aspect and allied Recharge buffs!) aren't currently doing anything for pets is annoying; although at least the Devs are aware of that... and they've also acknowledged a disparity between "Global" bonuses and "Set" bonuses which might be addressed SOON^TM (the former does not currently inherit - and whilst it's possible to make them do so it's a fair bit of work and might have knock-on impacts to how those IOs work in other places).
 

  

19 hours ago, Neiska said:

until they look at the real issues, like pet movement, pet re-summoning and re-buffing mid combat (especially during a cascading failure situation), all of this is very wishful thinking at best.

 

It won't matter what your pets max values are, if they SPLAT while resummoning them before you can even buff or heal them. It doesn't matter how they perform in +5 on teams, if it takes pets 30 seconds to move from pack to pack (being out of supremacy range the entire time until they catch up) and the pack is nearly dead by the time they get there. The pets may as not even be there for all the DPS they might contribute.

 

Don't get me wrong. I do appreciate them at least thinking about MMs in higher difficulties. But IMO this is the wrong way to go about it. 

 

I can assure you that the issues you're referring to here - pets being tricky to buff (or even to target!) after resummoning; and pet mobility being insufficient to keep pace with teammates are also well known to the devs.


  

2 hours ago, Neiska said:

 

2 hours ago, tidge said:

Since this is the MM forum:...I don't think Robotics got nerfed when it was changed, minimally:

• Maintenance Drone is a godsend.
• Knockback was all but eliminated from henchmen attacks.

The T3 missile burn patches were reduced in targets substantially, from 12 to 3 IIRC. The damage wasn't the initial hit, it was the fire puddle after that. The Drone is nice for secondaries that didn't have a heal, and the KB removal was nice. But the loss of the AOE was a bit impact, especially since Robots was the one primary that had good AoE

 

This is one area where @Neiska and I are definitely on the same page.

I've posted about the nerf (and it WAS a nerf!) to Robotic's AoE damage potential before here... but I'll restate the most relevant bit:

"Previously Incendiary Swarm Missiles were a 20ft radius AoE with a target cap of 16; then a separate 'Burn' patch Pseudopet spawned underneath each target affected which continually applied tick damage in an 8ft radius with a target cap of 5. After the change the Missiles were reduced to a 10ft radius AoE with a target cap of 10, and the Burn Patches were reduced to a target cap of 3.
Whilst the Battle Drones and Protector Bot damage did increase to compensate for this change... unfortunately these pets spawn at -2 and -1 to you in most content. So in practice the earlier setup of having the Assault Bot do more damage as an even-level pet was better. And it also meant you only needed to maximise damage slotting (ED-capped plus Soulbound and Explosive Strike procs) on a single pet - the T1 and T2 pets could be loaded up with Global IOs and +Def."

There were certainly some benefits from the changes - greatly reduced setup time; more reliable -Regen debuffing; and the ability to buff the inherent pet resistances via slotting the T1 upgrade for +DmgRes aspect... but it really did a number on Robotics' AoE damage potential. (They were the only MM primary that was actually fun to farm with!)

That said; Robotics is still comparatively very good at AoE damage compared to the other MM primary powersets. As well as being good vs foes with non-negligible HP regeneration (like AVs/GMs). So it's in a pretty decent place; even if there is definitely room for improvement (e.g. vs Bosses!). 

In any case; I'm hopeful that there are more upwards-trending changes coming both for MMs in general and for specific powersets.

((but seriously... anyone who thinks the devs are shying away from retuning anything are going to be really floored by the next patch...)) 👀
 

Edited 10 hours ago by Maelwys

[tidge]

I knew I could get you two to make nice :)

[Neiska]

21 minutes ago, Maelwys said:

 

  

 

Let me start off by saying that I've already stated; loudly; that I'd have preferred the devs put the "break even" point for MM damage output at +0 instead of at +2.

I completely get that it feels frustrating to be nerfed. 

However the reality of the purple patch is that there is a drastic damage decrease fighting anything over +2 - the damage dealt drops from 100% (+0s) -> 90% (+1s) -> 80% (+2s) -> 65% (+3s) -> 48% (+4s) -> 30% (+5s) -> 15% (+6s) -> 08% (+7s). And ON LIVE Mastermind T1 Henchmen spawn at -2 to you; which means if you're fighting +4s (let alone +5s!) those T1s will only inflict 15% of their raw damage; but your T3s would be inflicting 48% of their raw damage - making the T3s more than 3 times better off.

This is part of why masterminds suck vs higher-conning foes (the other parts being that the T1 pets also have a severely handicapped Hit Rate and tend to get one-shot).

Therefore if the Devs want to increase mob difficulty options across the playerbase (and they do!) then mastermind pets need to stop spawning lower-level.

That's the scenario we find ourselves in here, in a nutshell.

- - - - - - - - - -

However the devs want to tread exceptionally carefully.

The last time the devs made major adjustments to an AT was Tankers; and that did not go down very well. In i26p4 Tankers were buffed a lot; then in i28p2 those buffs were toned down a little bit. Currently Tankers are still far stronger than they were before i26p4 (see here); but because people had time to get used to the "too high" performance they screamed absolute bloody murder whenever the inevitable nerfs landed.

So the devs are VERY, VERY hesitant here - they really do not want to set the initial performance of Even-Level Henchmen (particularly damage output!) too high and then have to nerf it again later. Apparently the current plan is to first simply make pets even-level (this patch!) and give that a chance to get tested and "bed in"... then afterwards they can make further adjustments to tweak MM performance gradually (upwards!) until it hits a level that they're happy with.

We're not allowed to reveal the specifics of what's happening on Closed Beta. But CPH has already stated openly that there is a VERY BIG set of changes due next patch (after the holidays!). The MM changes currently in Open Beta were intentionally separated from that big patch in order to give everyone a decent opportunity to test them.

- - - - - - - - - -
 

OK. So the goal is to "make mastermind pets even-level" whilst altering current performance as little as possible.

...How?

Well... it turns out that hit rate is rather easy; as it's the same difference regardless of what you're fighting. So all you need's a flat tohit debuffs to the T1 and t2 pets. Done.

But keeping Survivability and Damage Output the same as before is much harder.
 

The differences in damage taken are at least linear - T1s going from a +6 foe hitting them to a +4 hitting them (13.25% less damage) is only a little different than going from a +2 foe hitting them to a +0 hitting them (18.03% less damage). So the Devs tried a few things here - and the one that made it to open Beta was -MaxHP (which didn't overly negatively impact  specific powersets; and was actually pretty balanced, until you remember that henchmen also take damage via bodyguard mode!). Ultimately, they reverted it; presumably because the Devs became comfortable that giving T1/T2 henchmen ~18%/10% higher survivability than before wasn't going to make the sky fall in.
 

The differences in damage output however are definitely not linear: because of the purple patch.
If they just left things as-is... the T1s would be dealing +33.93% damage vs +0s, +35.42% vs +1s, +43.59% vs +2s, +60% vs +3s, +160% vs +4s and +275% vs +5s.
So they need to "rebalance" the damage dealt; so that the pets break-even somewhere.
And they decided to set the break-even point at vs +2s.

(Shamelessly stealing CPH's table here...)

Test Delta [Base Damage]
	T1	T2	T3
+0	-25%	-10%	0%
+1	-17%	-9%	0%
+2	0%	0%	0%
+3	+30%	+10%	0%
+4	+92%	+30%	0%
+5	+125%	+62%	0%

And yes, that looks a bit rough for Masterminds who fight even-level foes.
However it's a slight increase in damage vs +3 mobs, and a HUGE comparative increase vs +4 mobs, let alone +5s.

And where, traditionally, do MMs tend to actually struggle? Yup... whenever you're fighting +4 mobs or higher.


There are also two reasons that I'm not particularly butthurt over this nerf to damage output vs +0 foes.

(i) Firstly; the T1 henchmen tend to contribute proportionally less of the MM's overall damage, so a -25% damage decrease for them in practice isn't nearly as bad as you might think (we've actually people in the Focussed Feedback thread who are posting practically identical cleartimes!).
(ii) Secondly; the differences in damage taken mean that T1/T2 henchmen are dealing less damage than before; and they're getting more of a survivability boost against +0 foes (18.03% less damage taken) than against +5 foes. (12.43% less damage taken). Which means that anyone who is choosing to fight +0 foes because they struggle at higher difficulty levels (e.g. non-optimized characters!) will at least be getting a hefty survivability boost to offset the lower damage dealt.

I do however appreciate that it's a particular PITA vs "levelless" foes like GMs; since you're effectively taking an extra DPS loss of -20% (T1s) and -10% (T2s).

  

 

I view the Set Bonus inheritance as an extra; rather than as something the Devs are implementing in order to offset the even-level changes. 
Set Bonuses having some kind of effect on henchmen has been a Quality-Of-Life request for MMs for some time.

KB Protection is definitely the main draw for me now; although +MaxHP is noticeably further beefing up the survivability of my T1s (as it's based on the Master's HP pool).

Also... the fact that Recharge Set Bonuses (and Recharge enhancement aspect and allied Recharge buffs!) aren't currently doing anything for pets is annoying; although at least the Devs are aware of that... and they've also acknowledged a disparity between "Global" bonuses and "Set" bonuses which might be addressed SOON^TM (the former does not currently inherit - and whilst it's possible to make them do so it's a fair bit of work and might have knock-on impacts to how those IOs work in other places).
 

  

 

I can assure you that the issues you're referring to here - pets being tricky to buff (or even to target!) after resummoning; and pet mobility being insufficient to keep pace with teammates are also well known to the devs.


  

 

This is one area where @Neiska and I are definitely on the same page.

I've posted about the nerf (and it WAS a nerf!) to Robotic's AoE damage potential before here... but I'll restate the most relevant bit:

"Previously Incendiary Swarm Missiles were a 20ft radius AoE with a target cap of 16; then a separate 'Burn' patch Pseudopet spawned underneath each target affected which continually applied tick damage in an 8ft radius with a target cap of 5. After the change the Missiles were reduced to a 10ft radius AoE with a target cap of 10, and the Burn Patches were reduced to a target cap of 3.
Whilst the Battle Drones and Protector Bot damage did increase to compensate for this change... unfortunately these pets spawn at -2 and -1 to you in most content. So in practice the earlier setup of having the Assault Bot do more damage as an even-level pet was better. And it also meant you only needed to maximise damage slotting (ED-capped plus Soulbound and Explosive Strike procs) on a single pet - the T1 and T2 pets could be loaded up with Global IOs and +Def."

There were certainly some benefits from the changes - greatly reduced setup time; more reliable -Regen debuffing; and the ability to buff the inherent pet resistances via slotting the T1 upgrade for +DmgRes aspect... but it really did a number on Robotics' AoE damage potential. (They were the only MM primary that was actually fun to farm with!)

That said; Robotics is still comparatively very good at AoE damage compared to the other MM primary powersets. As well as being good vs foes with non-negligible HP regeneration (like AVs/GMs). So it's in a pretty decent place; even if there is definitely room for improvement (e.g. vs Bosses!). 

In any case; I'm hopeful that there are more upwards-trending changes coming both for MMs in general and for specific powersets.

((but seriously... anyone who thinks the devs are shying away from retuning anything are going to be really floored by the next patch...)) 👀
 

 

I do appreciate all the time, math, support, and passion you show. Truely. But for now, I am at the "well, let's wait and see" stage. Mostly because going over all of HC history, most instances of "just wait guys, it will get better, we kiss-elbow promise" never came about. Or what they consider "better" is where we find ourselves now. Things aren't "better." Not for all of us. But forgive me if I am doubtful of what the end result will be. Which I expect will more or less be right where we are now, that is - 

 

-Some combinations are good, others are bad

-MMs still in the bottom 50% of overall AT performance, bottom 80% in some cases

-The weakest secondaries will remain there

- Fewer build options/more obligatory/forced slotting if you want to be viable at +5 or higher

- The major issues MMs face will remain there, at least for awhile

 

-Accuracy - Am I the only one who doesn't seem to have great difficulty with pet accuracy? That has never been a complaint of mine. I always take tactics, so that might be a part of it. But I am genuinely perplexed by this sudden "but their accuracy" notion is coming from. Sure, pets miss at times. But that's to be expected.

-Damage - Been discussed thoroughly. All I will say is that it still feels like a kick to the groin. 

 

People are free to like the changes. Just as people are free to dislike them. And regarding MMs specifically, I have generally disliked more changes than I have liked. About the only thing I liked was the new secondaries. That's really about it. But despite all the math and spreadsheets and whatnot (not just in this patch but previous patches) what is claimed and what I experience is not the same. "But its better now" does not hold true. At least for me. Quite the opposite. Things have gotten harder, and harder, and harder, and more tedious with each change. I duno, it could be because unless I 100% am forced to, I generally skip the personal MM attacks. And to this day I refuse to use them. We shouldn't "have" to. If I wanted to focus more on personal attacks, I would play my Crabbermind.

 

So I remain skeptical. Who knows, maybe they will shock us with a new primary set for MMs or something, or address the major issues, or maybe even add pet customization options. I expect those would almost universally be received well.

 

But I ever so tire of the "lateral" buffs with nerfs as part of the package, and people celebrating like it's this big massive boost or change to MMs. And if they gave the option to play the original HC pet sets, I would. Heck my old Robot/Time and Demons/Cold does better than most of my MMs now.

 

These aren't buffs. These are tweaks. If changes suddenly make MMs in the top 50% or even top 30% of AT performance, then we can all agree to call it a buff. (I don't mean those figures literally, only example for context)

 

They are free to surprise me. I hope that they do. But forgive me if I don't hold my breath. 

[Neiska]

16 minutes ago, tidge said:

I knew I could get you two to make nice 🙂

 

Maelwys and I have always agreed and disagreed on some things, depends on the thing mostly. But it's always been mutually respectful, or at least I felt it was that way. Which is a big part of the reason why I really respect them where MM stuff is concerned.

[tidge]

1 minute ago, Neiska said:

 

Maelwys and I have always agreed and disagreed on some things, depends on the thing mostly. But it's always been mutually respectful, or at least I felt it was that way. Which is a big part of the reason why I really respect them where MM stuff is concerned.

 

I get ya both. I know I have a very different opinion about the Swarm Missiles (old v. new), and I think it is partially because I was trying some radically different things and partially because my builds and play style (for 3 tiers of bots) were (possibly) nearly perfectly aligned to slide into those changes.... so I saw no real reduction in performance in the latter case, and tremendous improvement in the previous, oddball choices case. It's not like I expect a lot of players to Ouro the first Montague arc with just one robot at x8.

 

The only thing I couldn't (reliably) do any more after that round of robotic changes is solo Giant Monsters in Peregrine Island... but that is because I refuse to have a build with compromises for the purpose of keeping the GMs from running into each other. The Giant Monster ToHit Buffs has seriously crimped certain GM fights, noticeably Lusca, but that came later.

[Maelwys]

7 hours ago, Neiska said:

They are free to surprise me. I hope that they do. But forgive me if I don't hold my breath. 

Might need to wait a little bit; but you might crack a smile at some point 😉

(also I'm not all sunshine and rainbows - there are both nerfs and buffs in the pipeline; but at least the former seem to be aimed at specific powers rather than at entire ATs...)
 

  

7 hours ago, Neiska said:

 

Maelwys and I have always agreed and disagreed on some things, depends on the thing mostly. But it's always been mutually respectful, or at least I felt it was that way. Which is a big part of the reason why I really respect them where MM stuff is concerned.

 

Edited 2 hours ago by Maelwys

[Hedgefund]

To answer OP, I haven't been in the trenches on the MM changes despite this being the AT I'm most interested in how it changes.  I loathe respecs and have to be highly motivated to ever do one.  What I'm most excited about is the chance to sneak in a point of -kb for the pets.  I've long found KD patches among my biggest frustrations.  Unless you have some very specific powers (Elec Affinity or Team Teleport) you just have to wait it out.  It's not uncommon for me to slot, say 4 pieces of Unbreakable Guard + Glad Armor unique and it won't even require a respec to change that to 3 Glad Armors + whatever.  There'll be some opportunities for Fury of the Gladiator 3 slotting as well, I'm sure.  

 

I may look into what I can do for pets that don't have a bonus power that takes pet IOs like Ninja or Mercs.  I've had to do some tight-walk builds for those to include the ATOs.

[Xandyr]

I tried out a Thugs/Traps MM on open beta. I was pleasantly surprised when I saw that my pets all had soft capped defenses (I believe 52% was their lowest). I built it like I would any other MM, and it was nice seeing the pets having extra bonuses from my own set bonuses. Things like + Max HP, + Regen, KB protection(!) and the little bit of resists/etc were a nice touch. Obviously, you can't really expect the added +Regen to be a safe bet as far as a heal, but it did seem to help a little. I suspect that if one were to take /Pain, and really tried to enhance their set bonuses focused on + Max HP and Regen, that it would really help out since /Pain has Suppress Pain.

 

 I'm tempted to try that, as I love /Pain Domination....but I'm also kinda getting "burnt out" on /Pain seeing as I have way too many toons with it.

 

I also will admit that I love Mercs. Even from day 1. Seeing as the pets will be getting 40% of our set bonuses, and the other few things we're going to get, I am tempted to try and rack my brain on what would be the best/optimal pairing for Mercs to try and squeeze out as much as I can. And to do the same with Thugs.

 

 Anyway, I'm glad that the Devs are finally giving MMs some attention (especially the buffs Mercs got with the last MM update). Still holding on to the hope of a new Primary (Angel Summoning!!!), but will take what we can get.

[Heatstroke]

My plan... continue to ask for WIND CONTROL..