Been thinking a lot about minion survivability and I understand that balancing one thing means a whole lot of other things will be affected in the process.
But one thing I’ve seen many agree on is that the minion AI needs some work which I understand is no small ask.
I wanted to propose a quick fix in the meantime and share it with you all to hear your thoughts. Make the unique affix from Raven’s Rise (Minions take less damage while moving) a permanent stat for minions.
This encourages minion players to be more active with commanding their minions and addresses some of the survivability issues without overly buffing minions themselves. Also if you’re moving your minions then they are not attacking so this doesn’t seem to be game-breaking in terms of balance for them either.
It’s also helpful since the minion AI needs some updates, especially in higher corruptions where they are being decimated by AOE attacks. As of now even doing due diligence and attempting to move minions out of aoe’s is a hit-or-miss situation.
I do know that you can build minions to be more tanky but currently no matter how much you invest in minion survivability will be negated as soon a your pushing past 200c. (At least 1000% + in Minion HP so that you have an extra second before they get deleted by AOE’s)
Im at 250, and my minions dont die and I have about 400% inc minion health.
Skeletons are just in a sad state when it comes to health unless its solo archmage.
Most minions dont actually have issues staying alive. The ones that do are pretty much Storm crows and skeletons because they have terrible options for defensive scaling in tree, and have poor per attribute scaling.
For reference, minions at level 100 take 50% less damage globally from aoes, default minion feature, and take 45% less damage globally from all sources, which comes from the minion power stat which you get by leveling.
This means minions already reduce damage for most things they are getting hit by, by a whopping nearly 70%.
Adding more DR probably isnt gonna help them. They simply need to buff the low hp minions a bit.
Minions already have a 50% dr vs all dmg. From my experience, what is very little with minion builds, I ran into no issues with a Golem build and several hundret% minion hp and making minions crit immune and all the other stuff you can get from uniques an gear. When I ran squish setups my minions died a lot but that was my personal skill issue or maybe it just makes me happy to see minions die.
I don’t know I ran high corruption levels with minons as well, some of the best boss killing builds are minion builds. I don’t see any reason to make them even stronger. Sure moving them arround with the “A” button ism’t the greatest experience but it works wonders.
What are your thoughts on the move command/AI? I use minion command religiously but I’m finding a lot of trouble being able to direct them efficiently during boss fights for my necro where as I don’t have as much of an issue with BM.
There seems to be a delay in commands especially when im using the command button in quick succession trying to avoid boss telegraphs (Like Rahyeh’s pie death attack)
The main difference between the two would wolves just moving a lot faster.
It probably would be enough to just not have them blindly run, and/or stand, in aoe effects. Especially if you have already moved them out of the area with the ‘move’ command.
Boss casts AOE effect
-Minions: “KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL!!!”
-Me: Move out of that dmg
-Minions: “KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL!!!”
-Me: Move out of that dmg
-Minions: “KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL!!!”
-Me: Move out of that dmg
-Minions: “KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL!!!”
-Me: Move out of that dmg
-Minions: “KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL!!!”
-Me: Move out of that dmg
-Minions: “KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL!!!”
-Me: Move out of that dmg
-Minions: “KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL!!!”
-Me: Move out of that dmg
-Minions: “KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL!!!”
-Me: Move out of that dmg
-Minions: “KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL!!!”
-Me: Move out of that dmg
-Minions: “KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL!!!”
-Me: Move out of that dmg
-Minions: “KEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL!!!”
-Minions: Ded.
That’s a great point though that the main problem with skeletons specifically that they just dont scale well. I’m on my way to making squirrels and have been reading from others that its a task keeping em alive.
I’ve got my necro to level 100 and understand there’s a DR yet I’m experiencing (I think I got 889% inc Minion HP) AOE’s from rares and bosses are deleting all of minions. Of course the solution is move them but , from my experience, commanding them is very clunky with the delays and overshooting the point and etc.
EDIT: I didn’t realize that there was an additional AOE DR for minions as well. Thanks for that nugget!
Using minion command for Necros? Yes and GOD with skeletal mages they don’t even override their casting animation to move if the move order is to close to them.
This is less of an issue with beastmaster/wolves for me but the problem is that they over shoot where I command them to go lolll
Honestly? It’s better then nothing but most of the time it feels awefull. I wish I had some minion options from “Stay save!” to “LEEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!”.
So ranged mobs that “stay save” move out of stuff and stop dps, minions don’t run into big boss AoEs if it’s avoidable while Leroy mode makes them craycray and furthers their agro range and make them homing missles not caring for their well beeing.
Right now minion options are to little but I don’t give a rats ass because minions suck anyway .
I’m playing melee Beastmaster Storm Crows, and kinda concerned its a waste of time. I hear they will fall over and die above like corruption 400, which sucks seeing as there are multiple builds capable of 2 times that and more.
Even if I invest in minion life and keep up Aspect Of The Lynx with Critical Bite…am I wasting my time?
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